As Xander’s familiar touch rests on the small of my back, I expected his voice to be tender not clipped when he says, “We should tell the others.”
I look at him, confused by the pairing of tender touch and his harsh sounding words. His eyebrows are furrowed and his eyes resemble a storm ready to erupt.
I’m about to ask him what is wrong when Monica agrees, “Yes, let them know that she is awake and seems to be stable.”
Hesitantly, I nod at her and turn to leave with Xander, but he is already out the door. As I head for the door to catch up with him, a soft sob comes from behind me. “Wait.”
I turn to find Isabel walking over to me. As she stands before me, she gently holds my hands in hers. “Thank you for bringing her back
, Jes.”
An impetuous knot tangles in my throat. I can barely squeeze out the words. “Yeah, you are welcome.”
Isabel looks beyond me and lifts her chin. “Can you tell Xander thank you for me?”
A little uncomfortable about Xander’s quick escape, I nod and smile. “I better catch up with him to tell the others.”
I squeeze her hand, and then leave the room in search of Xander. I round the corner by the nurse’s station and see Xander standing in the middle of the hallway with his back to me and his head downcast. Without even concentrating, I heard his thoughts.
“He killed my parents. For God’s sake, he killed her mother! How can I feel sorry for this man? How can she feel sorry for him?”
I slow my pace and soften my steps, not wanting to startle him. I see his shoulders tense under his shirt as his hands push deeper into his pockets and he rocks back on his heels. My foot accidentally scuffs along the tile floor and Xander whips around to face me. Xander’s brief moment of vulnerability instantly fades and the indecipherable facade he has decidedly adopted around me is back in place.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to...”
Obviously irked, Xander runs a hand through his hair. “Don’t be sorry alright!”
I didn’t need his attitude right now. I roll my eyes and walk past him. “Fine. Isabel says thank you since you were in such a hurry to leave!”
I hear him groan in frustration as I continue to walk, but he says nothing to redeem himself.
Xander quickly catches up to me on our way back to the cafeteria. I look out of the corner of my eye at him and wonder what he saw when I went into Corinna’s mind. Did he see my interaction, I mean Corinna’s, with Sam? Could that have him on edge with me?
Screw it, I’m asking. “When you followed me into Corinna’s mind, what did you see?”
Xander slows his pace, but does not stop. I follow in suit. He opens his mouth to say something, and then quickly shuts it. He scratches the side of his head, looks at me, and then looks down the hall. “Well, I really couldn’t see as much as I could hear and feel.”
Oh crap! Me and Sam, he felt what I was feeling. That is why he can’t look at me.
I stop in the middle of the hallway and cross my arms over my chest. “And, what did you feel?”
Still walking, Xander realizes I have stopped, turns, and walks back toward me slowly. He leans against the wall across from me, rests his head against the wall, and closes his eyes. His voice is croaks, “All of it.”
I can’t imagine what he thinks about me after hearing me, I mean Corinna, talk and “interact” with Sam in the way I did. Sam was the only person he trusted for years, and then he used him, deceived him. I just twisted the knife that had already cut him deeply by having this intimate moment with him as Corinna. “It wasn’t me, Xander.”
Xander slowly pushes off of the wall and stands in front of me. His eyes search mine with compassion now. “Jes, I know it was Corinna feeling those things for him, not you. She is linked to Sam. It makes sense that you would feel Corinna’s emotions for him.”
He isn’t mad at me. A wave of relief fills me.
Then Xander’s jaw tightens and I feel the worry resurface. “It wasn’t just Sam being sadistic and evil
, Jes. Michael, he orchestrated everything Sam has become.”
Xander looks down at his feet and shakes his head. When he looks back up at me, his eyes are glassy. “I want to hate him so much right now, but after experiencing what we just did I can’t.” Xander yells, “Why the hell can’t I hate him right now
, Jes?”
I know what he means. I can’t quite wrap my head around it either; the compassion I have for this man that has done so many terrible things. Without debating the repercussions, I run my hand along Xander’s cheek. His hand slips around my waist and pulls me flush against his chest, sending a rush of desire straight through me. I lean into him waiting for his lips to graze mine when I feel his lips rest on my forehead. Okay, I wasn’t expecting that.
Xander pulls back, quickly releases me and steps away from me. He puts his hands in his pockets and starts walking backwards down the hall while looking at me. “C’mon. We need to tell Sebastian, Balthazar and the rest that Corinna is awake.”
I want to ask him what just happened, why he did not kiss me. Did he not feel what I felt just then? I didn’t though. Maybe the whole dream state experience between Sam and Corinna did get under his skin after all; it definitely got under mine. It made me curious about the similarities between Sam and Corinna’s link and Nate’s and mine.
Having caught up to Xander now, I look over at him for any hints that he is listening in on my thoughts. Nothing; good. Experiencing Sam and Corinna’s link, the raw connection I felt, I wonder now if the intensity between Nate and I was really just the link or something more organic and raw; real. Could something have been happening between Nate and I before the intersection and we just denied it? When Nate and Ezra were pulled into that wormhole, I felt something within me being stripped from me. Then, when Nate came to me in my dream this morning, the emptiness within me instantly filled; He filled it.
The thought of Nate not coming back runs through my mind and I feel hot, panic surface within me. I look sideways at Xander, his jaw is working back and forth like he is deep in thought.
Would Xander be the one to fill the emptiness if Nate were to never return? Could he fill it? Would I let him?
Xander and I round another corner and make eye contact with Sebastian and Balthazar exiting the doors of the cafeteria with the other guardians. Sebastian, “We were coming to find you. What happened? ”
We both rush to them and Xander is the first to speak. “She’s awake.”
Jake, “Is it her, or the…”
Nick elbows him and scoffs. “Dude, if it wasn’t her do you think Jes and Xander would be standing here right now? They would be shredded.”
Balthazar shakes his head slowly, “It will be a long road to get her back to herself.”
Sebastian puts his hand on his son’s arm. “We did it once, Balthazar. We will do it again with her.”
The exchange between the two of them was an obvious reflection on Balthazar being stripped of his Sondian Copula and re-implanted with a Dobrian Copula. Balthazar went through what Corinna will. She will need all the help she can get, just as Balthazar did.
Sebastian looks at me. “She is physically stable. That is a step in the right direction.”
He walks passed Xander and I, leaving us all standing, following him only with our eyes. He angles his head to get a look at all of us ogling him and motions for us to follow. Sebastian’s eyes linger on me a moment longer, “Come. I know you have a lot to tell us.”
What the hell? Sebastian has obviously mastered getting into my head as easily as Ezra.
Balthazar, Xander, and the rest of the team follow Sebastian back into the cafeteria. Distracted, I slowly trail behind not able to shake a thickening tickle festering in my throat.
We settle into a conference room off of the main hall of the facility. I give them the step by step of Xander and I getting Isabel to agree to let us try to bring Corinna back. I told them everything about Corinna and my shared memories and feelings. Rehashing the experience in front of them had me blushing a little. Nick, in Nick-form made the most of it. “Jes. Wow, that was hot.”
On cue, Elisha elbows him in the gut and hisses, “Nick.”
Nick rubs his side and laughs a little. He looks at me and sees my stoic expression as I glare at him. Immediately, he shifts in his seat and raises his hands in surrender, “My bad.”
Xander tells the team what he experienced. Sebastian is particularly intrigued with how he was able to bring me out of Corinna’s mind. “Xander, it takes an immense amount of mental control and focus to bring someone out of a telepathic experience like the one Corinna and Jesca shared.”
Sebastian folds his hands together and leans them on the table. He looks at Xander. “It is more than just an act of control and focus though. This connection that you and Jesca share is a very strong bond, Xander. ”
Sebastian looks at me for a moment,
and then Sebastian looks at Balthazar. “Sometimes a bond surpasses the power of a link, right son?”
Balthazar is holding Marcus in him arms. He looks up at Sebastian and smiles softly. I look down at my folded hands, knowing that the comment was not only for Balthazar, but for me to think on.
Suddenly very thirsty, I reach for the pitcher of water and plastic cup in the center of the table and pour myself a glass. I drink down two cupfuls in record time and just as I pour my third glass, Siobhan comments, “Hey, thirsty much.”
The third cup quenches my thirst for a moment, but the dryness in my throat returns, not having been sated. I feel my esophagus spasm a little. I try clearing my throat and swallowing to relieve the spasm. Sitting next to me now, Xander leans over and asks, “You okay?”
Trying to not make a big deal of it, I nod and speak to Sebastian. “Corinna, she showed me conversations she had with Sam. The thing is I could feel everything Corinna felt in the memories. Xander could feel everything as well. ”
With no response from Sebastian, I shift forward and look at Balthazar. “Sam said he had no intention of following Michael Sanderson’s orders once he got beyond the black hole into this other place. He said he had to make things right. I think Corinna was trying to tell me something about Sam. Like a hint as to why he turned against Michael.”
Balthazar shifts in his seat and raises his voice an octave, “Michael screwed him and he realized it, just like I did. Plain and simple. Sam committed horrific crimes against humanity and now he is seeking redemption, like I am.”
Balthazar closes his eyes and takes in a long deep breath. When he reo
pens them and speaks, his voice is calmer. “I know I don’t have to remind you that he has done terrible things in his life, Jesca.”
There is no deny
ing that he has. He killed Xander’s parents, my mother, and many others. But Michael, he had something on them to do that. Then it clicks. “He agreed to go along with Michael’s order to make right what he has done wrong! He is searching for them, those that he wronged. He is seeking redemption for Xander’s parents and my mother’s death!”
A familiar voice comes from the door way behind me. “Ah, but the question is where does Sam Crest think he has gone with Ezra and Nate in search of his redemption? He is looking for souls that have passed on, no? Where have they passed
, Jesca? ”
I whip my head around and see a man that I never thought I would see again. Someone from my old life, my childhood back in Georgia. Someone I never thought would be a part of what my life’s purpose is now as a guardian. Pastor Daniel. He clears his throat. “Beyond the veil of our universe and into another, where the physical isn’t necessary and the metaphysical dominates. What do you think
, Jesca? Is it possible that this place they have gone could be Heaven or Hell?”
Partially ignoring his questioning, I scoot the chair back and look at Sebastian, then Pastor Daniel again. “What are you doing here Pas…”
He raises one hand to stop myself mid-sentence, bows his head and smiles. “Just Daniel Reneux, dear. I never could get used to the Pastor part. Guardian Daniel Reneux suits me much better and is much truer to form.”
Nearly knocking him over, I wrap my arms around his waist. His embrace is awkward and I hear him laugh a little under his breath. “I’m here for the same reasons you are
, Jesca. My purpose in the grand scheme of things.”
I don’t know what triggers it, but waves of
memories, my childhood in Georgia, come crashing in all at once. Meeting Daniel for the first time. Watching him on the pulpit at church, seeing him in the bookstore where I worked.
Daniel pulls me from him gently and hands me a handkerchief from his pocket. He leads me back to the table and pats my shoulder. “Sit. You all seemed to be knee deep in a conversation involving Samson Crest. Please continue.”
Daniel pulls a chair up to the table. I look at him, taking in his features. It’s surreal to see him standing right here next to me. He crosses his leg over the other and leans back, waiting for our conversation to continue.
Angela rests her elbows on
the table and leans in toward Daniel. “A possible Heaven and Hell, really? Adam Claiborne told us that the beings invading our world were soulless, that they were drawn to our world, us, because of our souls. If this world beyond the veil is where Xander’s parents, Jesca’s mother, and every other dead person has gone, then why did Claiborne tell us they were soulless. Heaven and Hell contains the souled. ”