Authors: Nia Shay
"Thanks," I muttered as he deposited me against the back bumper of my car.
He held out a hand. "Your keys. You are intoxicated."
"Am not," I groused, fishing in the bottom of my purse. "Do you even remember how to drive?" I added. I'd had to teach him twice in the time I'd known him.
"I'll manage."
"Wait." I kept my grip on the keychain as he went to take it from me. "I need to ask you something before I go anywhere with you." He literally cringed, but didn't refuse to answer. So I asked, "How old is Ardith Simms?"
His dark brows lifted in surprise. Clearly he'd been expecting the more obvious question. "It's been over a year since I saw her last. I suppose by now she would be thirty-five."
Relief flooded through me, followed by guilt. The poor woman's injuries were no less tragic just because she wasn't a child, as I had been when I'd entered Zeph's service. But I couldn't help seeing myself in her place, scarred and insane and not yet old enough to drive.
A similar level of disquiet showed on his face, but he didn't bring it up. Instead, he gestured me toward the car. "I'll see you safely home, Jandra."
"I know you will." I sighed as I slid into the passenger seat. It was still pushed back all the way from the other night, and I groped under the seat for the adjustment lever. I felt like a little kid with my legs dangling in all that extra space.
"Open your mind to me."
I looked up, startled by Zeph's sudden command. The tone of his voice touched an instinctive switch in my alcohol-softened brain, and I obeyed without resistance. He sucked in a harsh breath as our thoughts merged. I felt his mind in turn, realizing he'd only wanted to tap into my knowledge of roadway etiquette.
"Don't do that to me again," I grumbled.
"I won't." He put the car in gear and swung confidently out of the parking space.
I stayed quiet and allowed him to concentrate, watching as the city slipped by outside the windows. Clouds had gathered in the evening sky, blotting out fledgling stars and threatening rain, but the streets were alive nonetheless. Shoppers hustled past cars in a deadly game of chance, as if they were all perfectly aware of the briefness of their lives. But the rhythm of their thoughts sang a different song, one of frantic need and desires unfulfilled. A strange dichotomy--I'd never understood it, anyway. I hunched up in my seat, pierced by a sudden loneliness.
I suppose I must have dozed off. It seemed like no time at all before we were slowing to a stop in my driveway. Sitting up, I blinked at Zeph, who gave me a brief, searching look before shutting off the ignition. He slipped out of the driver's seat and circled around the front to open my door for me.
"Thanks." I accepted his hand as I stood. I wobbled a bit in my heels, a testament to how rarely I drank. When I touched him, I noticed he'd cut himself off from me. His presence in my mind was a humming blank. In hindsight, it had been since we'd left the restaurant. I frowned. "What are you hiding from me?"
"Nothing."
I snickered. "What, you just want to be alone?"
"Don't concern yourself," he replied gruffly.
"It is my concern," I argued as I trailed after him. "We have to figure out what to do next. You're not going with Briggs, obviously...."
He glanced over his shoulder at me. "Why shouldn't I?"
"Oh, I don't know. Maybe because he's got a big fat ulterior motive? And why didn't your voice affect him, by the way?"
He turned away, unlocking the front door and ushering me inside before he answered. "It did affect him. But Briggs is a soldier, well trained in the art of resistance. And I was...somewhat distracted at the time."
"Remembering something painful?" I shuddered as I recalled the shared sensation.
He nodded slowly. "I had what you would call a 'spontaneous recollection' from my last visit to a Society safe house."
"What?" But it came clear to me as soon as I asked. I'd felt it, too. His scars...I laid my hands on his back without thinking, my fingertips seeking the roughened grooves through the fine silk of his shirt. "
They're
the ones who took your wings?" I whispered. "Oh, my God."
He froze at my touch. "I can but hope God had nothing to do with it."
Words failed me. I just stood there gasping, a prelude to tears. Zeph glared over his shoulder, his eyes hard and black as jet. "Stop it, Jandra."
"But...."
"It will be for the best." He turned back toward the stairs. "Sleep well."
"What the hell?" I seized his wrist. "Don't walk away from me when I'm talking to you!"
He dragged me along for several steps before finally stopping, giving me a sidelong look. "I must walk away from you in the end, mustn't I?"
"Not like this! Not if it means putting you in the hands of psycho zealots who want to torture you!"
"Briggs doesn't intend to torture me." Now he faced me fully, his expression bleak. "He intends to see me dead."
"Jandra?" Zeph's voice sounded hollow as it drifted through the bathroom door. "Are you well?"
I was, in fact, not well. Upon realizing Zeph planned to commit honorable suicide, my stomach had plummeted, then exploded. So much for the chicken marsala. Panting in the wake of my heave session, I clawed the door open and pinned him with an icy glare. "You are
not
going with Briggs."
"It's not open for discussion. Come, let me help you into bed."
"I'm not going to bed, and you're not going to Prague. As you said, end of discussion."
He regarded me with a beautifully, blissfully blank expression. "Why does this upset you so, Jandra? You have wished for my death many times."
"I said
I
was going to kill you.
Me
. Not somebody else. And...I didn't really mean it, okay?"
"No?" He tilted his head. "I don't understand."
"Of course you don't." I sagged drunkenly against his chest. He'd discarded his shirt at some point, and I let out an involuntary sigh at the warmth of his skin against my cheek. "I wanted to hurt you because you hurt me, stupid."
"That was never my inten...."
"Just shut up and listen, Zeph. You don't understand because you don't really know what pain is. You may have felt it, but you forget what it's like when it goes away. My pain hasn't gone away, not in all this time we've been apart. I buried it, but I couldn't forget."
"Nor could I," he breathed. "I am certain now. It wasn't the dreams that changed me, Jandra. It was you."
"Great." I dashed away the tears forming in the corners of my eyes. "And now you want to die because of it."
"No. The fault is my own." He stepped back, his hands lingering on my shoulders until I stood up straight. He sighed heavily. "It's still the right thing to do."
"What're you talking about? What's your fault?"
"I saw. In your mind." He touched my hair gently, a sad smile on his lips. "When you look at me, you see a monster. I don't think I can bear to see myself reflected in your eyes that way."
"Again, what are you talking about?"
"You know."
I thought about it for a moment, and.... Oh, hell. He must have glimpsed my fearful imaginings when he'd connected our minds in the parking lot. So he'd based this whole decision on one of the most immature, nonsensical reactions I'd ever had in my life. "Damn it!" I shrieked, shoving him away from me. He hit the opposite wall with a surprised grunt. "Why do you
always
think you know how I feel?"
"What am I to think, Jandra?" His shoulders hunched as if the impact had actually hurt him. "I saw your horror, your revulsion. You've told me countless times that you despise me...."
"That doesn't mean I want you to die, idiot!"
"Then what does it mean?"
"I don't know!" I paused, panting as I stared him down. "I guess it means I still want you to be who I thought you were," I added in a more subdued tone. "Pretty pathetic, huh?"
He hung his head. "You are ashamed of me."
"Sometimes, yeah. But things can't get any better if you're dead." The word seemed to stick in my throat, making it draw painfully tight. "Don't do this, Zeph. Don't put your blood on my hands."
"Are you...crying?"
"No." I covered my face. "No."
He moved close again--I could feel his body heat warm the air around me. "Let me hold you, Jandra," he whispered.
I didn't have the strength to deny myself the comfort he offered. Choking on a sob, I fell into his arms. "Don't go." I moaned the words against his biceps.
He stood silent for a long moment before replying. "If I don't meet with Briggs tomorrow, he'll likely send the authorities after me. I've been in violation of the law since I left my home. And I suppose I still am, since you're no longer my Warden. I would have to go into hiding."
"Fine, then that's what we'll do." I looked up at him, wiping tears from my cheeks. "There's got to be someone who'll help us."
"You said...
us
?" His eyes widened.
"Yeah, well. Don't read too much into it." I laughed convulsively. "Your head is still a mess, and we haven't figured out why yet. You can't just go running off by yourself. You need me."
His breath eased out in a soft hiss. "I always have."
Reaching up, he traced the curve of my cheek with his fingertips. I didn't resist as he tilted my chin up. I didn't turn from him as he leaned in. And as our lips met, my defenses shattered like thin glass. Suddenly he was inside me, and I inside him, our hearts and minds mingling freely. I felt his surprise and wonderment echo my own. His arms went tighter around me, crushing me against his chest as he deepened our kiss. His tongue nudged at my lips and I opened to him, eliciting a growl from deep in his throat.
I made an eager noise of my own as I clung to his shoulders, awash in the heat of passion. I hardly noticed when he slid an arm under my butt and lifted me. His grunt of frustration startled me back to awareness a moment later.
Opening one eye, I saw he'd carried me to my bedroom door. I'd closed it earlier, and his first instinct had been to kick it out of his way. Fortunately he'd known better, but he had no desire to take a hand off me to open it.
I didn't want to let go of him, either. I had to force my fingers away from the smooth, muscled curve of his shoulder. Reaching awkwardly behind myself, I finally managed to twist the knob. Zeph darted through, using his elbow to push the door open. The only light came from the fire of his eyes, bathing the room in amethyst brilliance.
I turned a hazy smile up at him as he laid me on the bed. "Zeph," I whispered, grasping at him. He stayed still, poised above me with one knee on the mattress. His shoulders heaved with deep, ragged breaths. When I reached for him again, he pinned my hands down on either side of my head. I squirmed. "What's the matter?"
He didn't speak, but suddenly I could feel it. Joined as we were, the balance of energy had begun to shift between us. It was only natural--it was innate for me to draw from him. I'd just been too distracted to realize I'd been doing it. In the void I'd left inside him, I could sense a growing hunger.
Damn it, it was too soon for that. But I'd passed the point of caring. "Don't stop," I begged.
"I must." Desire deepened his voice so I could barely understand him. "You won't be safe."
"I'm fine." Or I would be, once he got the hell down here and kissed me again. Frustrated, I bucked against his restraining hands, getting absolutely nowhere. "Zeph, please...!"
Shuddering, he squeezed his eyes shut. The room plunged into darkness. "Be still."
Those two short words seemed to hang between us forever and a moment, soaring and twining into infinite melodies. I froze, fascinated in spite of myself by the full power of his voice--the power I'd fled from in terror, once upon a time. Now that I knew it again, my fear seemed ludicrous. It didn't even matter that he'd told me I couldn't have what I wanted. It only made me want it all the more.
By the time I could think clearly again, I lay alone on the mattress. Zeph had retreated to the doorway. "I'm...sorry," he grunted between shallow breaths.
"Wait." I tried to get up, to go to him, but it seemed his command still held sway over my will. I might as well have been swimming upstream--I managed to rise up on my elbows, but no further. "Come back to me," I whimpered.
"Don't...ask me...again." A tremor racked his body. "I might hurt you."
"I trust you, Zeph."
"Good."
And I faced a closed door.
"Damn it!" I flung myself back against the pillows, tears of defeat scalding my eyes. That small pain gave way to a greater one, as if my blood had begun to boil in my veins. My body blazed with the energy I'd unwittingly drained from him. I hadn't dispelled any of it this time--only my tattered control could dictate how I metabolized it now. Meditation was out of the question at this point. And so, apparently, was vigorous physical activity.
So I burned, perhaps not literally, but with the heat of all my yearning and confusion. With the crushing fear of losing what I'd convinced myself I no longer wanted. With the realization I'd been lying to myself all this time, and I hadn't even been doing a good job of it. I rolled onto my stomach and screamed into the pillows.
"Calm yourself."
Startled, I raised my head as the words echoed through me, a cool breeze trickling down the mental link that still connected me to Zeph. I could sense him in his room upstairs. He lay facedown on the same patch of carpet I'd found him on that morning. I realized then he'd chosen the spot directly above my bed--as close to me as I'd allowed him to get.
"What just happened?" I whispered aloud to my empty room.
"Things have gotten out of hand again,"
he channeled.
"It would seem we have been too long apart. Or perhaps more has changed within us than we even yet realize."
"Well, whatever. Come back down here. You need to feed, don't you?"
"Soon, yes. But I mustn't lose control again."