I need tea.
And the book that’s always given me comfort when I needed it most.
I need
The Knight of the Rose
.
I get up as quietly as I can, but Shelley still grumbles because her pillow of my limbs is now removed, and—crazy dog—the actual fluffy mattress is apparently less comfy than sleeping on my limbs.
I put on my fluffy pink robe, shove my feet into my slippers, and then pad gently down the steps, avoiding the top one because it creaks.
But Virago isn’t asleep on the couch, like I thought she’d be.
She’s not in the living room at all, or the kitchen, and the door was open to the bathroom, so she’s not there either.
She’s not in the study, and she’s not in the library.
I stay very still for a long moment, holding the robe closed over my chest, my heart beating wildly against my hands as I stand in my living room, listening to the stillness of the house.
Did she leave?
She wouldn’t have left—would she?
And why does it matter
so much
if she did?
Yeah, right, Holly.
I grimace, sigh, biting my lip.
You know the answer to that.
As I stand in the middle of my living room, my heart pounding, a flash of light to the left makes me turn.
I’d drawn the blinds over the back sliding door before we got ready for bed, but they’re pulled up now, and the sliding glass door to the backyard is very slightly left ajar, maybe by a few inches.
I cross over to the door, my fingers brushing against the handle as I peer out into the darkness.
It’s not that dark out—after all,
it’s almost the full moon, and the light from my neighbors’ porch lights and the street lamps out front make the backyard pretty illuminated.
So I can see that out in the center of the yard is Virago.
The flash I that drew my eyes to her was light glancing off the blade of her sword, for she stands, holding the hilt in both hands, as she crouches on the lawn, the blade hefted high and at attention over her head.
The sleeves of her new shirt are rolled up, and she’s not wearing her tie, her vest or her jacket, and the shirt is no longer tucked into her pants.
She’s unbuttoned a handful of the bottom buttons, and I can see her tanned, muscular stomach through the inverted “v” that the two sides of the shirt make, framing her skin like it’s a work of art.
Because it is.
Virago crouches low, her thighs tight, in a sword-fighting stance.
I only know that because I’ve seen the knights do mock sword-fighting “matches” after the jousting, because I’ve looked at medieval tapestries of knights, because I’ve read books about them and watched a ton of medieval dramas and movies.
I’ve never actually seen this happen in real life.
For…well…
real
.
I press my hands to the glass panes of the door, mouth open, as I watch her stand, statue-like, her body in perfect form, beautiful beyond description.
She exudes this raw sensuality, and this great, pulsing power that renders me speechless.
I am in awe as I watch her stand, head held high.
Proud.
And then she bursts into motion, whipping the sword around in a seamless, circular arc as if a thousand opposing knights stand in front of her.
The sword moves through the air like quicksilver, flashing and darting, jabbing and thrusting, and Virago is at the center of this maelstrom of blade, moving as effortlessly as a dancer, as graceful as one, too.
And that’s exactly what it is that she’s doing in that moment, I realize:
she’s
dancing
.
It’s deadly, but still beautiful, the way the sword glitters, there and then not there almost in that same instant, she moves so quickly.
She’s effortless in her speed so much so that it looks like she has multiple arms with multiple swords, the arcs she creates hanging suspended in the air for a heartbeat, a crescent of light, before they fade away.
It’s beautiful.
She’s
beautiful.
I actually don’t think I’ve ever seen something
more
beautiful.
I back away from the door, clutching at my robe, and then I turn and walk quickly back to the stairs, then run upstairs.
I take the steps two at a time, actually, pausing at the bathroom because
The Knight of the Rose
is still by the tub, exactly where I left it last night.
I stand, shaking, my slippered feet against the cool linoleum, soaking up the cold, even through the soles.
The solidity of the cover of
my book
is now between my fingers, and then I hold it over my heart like a shield.
I close my bedroom door behind me as I enter, leaning against the wood, and folding forward and down until I’m sitting on the floor.
My bedside lamp is still on from when I got up, but Shelley’s ignoring me, fast asleep and dead to the world.
The first tear slides down my cheek.
I’m surprised, reach up, touch the warm wetness with my finger.
And then another comes.
And another.
Even if I broke up with Nicole, this is never going to work.
Virago and me.
There are so many obvious problems.
I don’t know if she’s like me, if she loves women.
And let’s not forget the ultimate and most painful clincher:
she’s from another world.
If we’re able to vanquish the beast, she’s going back, and I’m going to stay here.
In my world.
It’s totally star-crossed is what it is.
I almost laugh to myself as I cry, because it’s so
ridiculous
.
Why am I falling in love with a woman I can’t have?
Aren’t I smarter than this, smart enough to realize that this was doomed from the start?
No.
I don’t think being “smart” has anything to do with it.
I crack open my book, my beloved book, the book that’s saved me my whole life.
And there, on the page, is something that
does
make me laugh, but just a thin, faint, humorless chuckle.
And then I weep again, silent tears tracing themselves down my face,
plunking
hollowly against my robe.
Miranda knelt before the Lady Seraphina, a blazing intensity to her gaze.
“I have journeyed every day until the nightfall, have journeyed every night until the daystar rose,” she whispered.
“I have fought through the perils of the Fangheart valley and the desolation of the Shadow Mountains, have ridden on the dragon of the moon and out-witted the sirens at Briar Cove.
All of this, and more, I have done to come now to your door, and kneel at your feet, beloved Seraphina.
For there is no other woman in all the world for me, and I would do anything and everything in my power to prove that to you.
And if your curse is not yet broken by all I have done, then will I continue to journey across this world, to every end of it, and I will fight and I will outwit and I will find more courage still, beloved lady, and I will do all of this for you.
Please be kind, lady…tell me what I must do that I can free you, that I can prove to you the depth of my affections.
For there is not a moment in the day in which my heartbeat does not whisper your name.
All I am, all I have done, all that I would do, is for your love alone.”
And Seraphina knelt down, too, her skirts billowing about her as she took the knight’s face between her two soft hands, and Seraphina kissed the knight Miranda passionately, thoroughly and deeply.
For through Miranda’s tireless and relentless journey, through her courage and her love, she had lifted the curse that bound the Lady Seraphina.
And they rose together, the knight lifting the lady in her arms as easily as if she were a doll, though Seraphina was most certainly not.
And Miranda carried Seraphina to the edge of the bed and set her gently down upon the coverlet.
“I have done everything for you, and I would do more still,” whispered Miranda to the lady.
And the lady gazed up at her with darkening eyes, pulling the knight down beside her.
“There is only one thing more I would have you do,” Seraphina whispered, wrapping her fingers in Miranda’s hair.
I close the book, push it away from me on the floor.
I remember the first time I read that scene.
I was crying then, too, in high school of course, falling in love with my best friend…Carly.
It was totally star-crossed, too.
Carly was very obviously straight, but we don’t often want what we know we can have, do we?
She’d just met David online (this is before it was super cool, and was—in fact—actually a little creepy to meet anyone online, back when there wasn’t so much an internet as various chat rooms hooked up by a modem), and was gushing about him, because he loved paranormal stuff as much as she did, and he actually had the same theories for the Loch Ness monster and the Jersey Devil, and it was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened to her, meeting him, because they were obviously meant to be together, she said, and that she was falling in love with him.
And that was the very first time I wondered if I was meant to be alone my entire life.
I read that scene in the book that long ago day, read it three times in a row, tears leaking out of the corners of my eyes as I calmed down my breathing, still felt the rush of my heartbeat.
I wanted something, so desperately, like what Miranda and Seraphina had found, wanted something like that so much that, that like Miranda, I was willing to do whatever it took to find it.
My passionate declaration to myself to find that kind of passionate, forever love fizzled out and disappeared as life went on, as I realized that I could never be with Carly, as I went to college and met girls who were like me and fell in love with them and had my heart broken multiple times.
I was always the one with bad luck in love.
It’s like my thing.
And then Nicole came, and just cemented that.
I fall in love with the wrong people.
With the people I can’t have.
It’s what I
do
.
I’m almost famous for it.
Down below in my backyard is someone so amazing, I can’t even understand it.
And I’m falling in love with her.
And we aren’t meant to be.
Chapter 9:
Things Left Unsaid
I wake up to Shelley, who’s weaseled her way up from the foot of the bed to lay beside me on top of the coverlet, licking my face ferociously.
“Oh, my goodness, okay,” I mutter, rubbing her behind the ears and sitting up.
My hair is every which way, and my eyes are crusty, but those aren’t
exactly
the first things I notice.
Because Virago’s standing in the doorway to my bedroom, her hip leaning on the door jamb, one hand on the other side of her hip, one brow up.
“Good morrow,” she says with a smile, her lips twitching to the side as I pull my sheet up to cover my incredibly sexy (hah!) pajamas that happen to have little cartoon cows jumping over deranged-looking moons in a repeating pattern.
She raises her other brow, gestures behind her.
“I took the liberty to make a breakfast for the both of us.
If you wish to come downstairs…”
She inclines her head toward the hall behind her, takes a step back, still smiling with enough raw sex appeal to make me actually melt.
She does a little bow, flicking her bright blue gaze to my eyes.
“Please.”
Then she turns and walks away, striding over the carpet in my hallway like she owns the place, her body so fluid and graceful that I can’t help but watch her until she’s out of sight around the corner, my eyes drawn to her like her body possesses its own gravity.
I stumble into my bathroom, gazing at my reflection.
I then sigh for about five minutes at what I see staring back at me in the mirror.
Great.
I look
terrible.
There are dark circles under my eyes because I stayed up too late reading (and, you know, crying), my hair is all over the place (quite similar to the illustrated depictions of Medusa, actually), and my cow-and-moon covered pajamas are askew.
So, so attractive.
I drag a brush through my hair several times until it’s somewhat tamed, brush my teeth, change my clothes into jeans and a blank tank top and get downstairs in enough time to open the back sliding door for a very desperate Shelley to race outside to attend to her business.
The smell hits me when I enter the kitchen, and I get a little weak in the knees.
Not because Virago is standing there in one of my aprons (the one with the two giant teapots on the front over where your breasts are.
A charming gift from Carly), though I do get a little weak kneed from that, admittedly.
But because there are two plates on the counter, covered in carefully arranged and heavily buttered slices of perfectly-brown toast next to fresh strawberries sliced neatly in half, and a handful of the snow peas we bought last night, arranged into a fan shape around the strawberries.