Echoes in Eternity (The Pella Series Book 1) (71 page)

“I want this time! I may never get another chance with him again!”

“
Fine!
” Alex’s voice hisses with a cold indignation. “
Five minutes and not a second more! Your time starts now. Then you exit, come hell or high water!
”

It’s as if they were never there, the voices silence in my mind and the tugging stops. I’m jolted back into my skin and my eyes open.

“Dad?” With some resolve, my father starts talking in rapid fire.

“Listen to me, baby: You are vulnerable until the time you recover your own memories. Your kind, the Nephilim had not always been hunted. There was a time when they prospered and naturally took over the world. But people fought back. The favored children of Jehovah had to inherit the world. You are still half of me. Alexander is still half
of Aidan. I can’t tell you his father’s celestial name. Not yet. There was a time he went by Leonidas. Avoid him at all cost.”

“Why? Do you think he’ll sell me out?”

“No, he won’t. But he is a danger to your safety.”

“You’re not giving me much, dad! Time is ticking!”

“You already know what you need to know!”

“You’re not surprised about Maximillian Courcillion,” I state
, changing directions.

“No, I’m not. Maximillian Courcillion was your former fiancée.”

“So, said Hailey. I gather we weren’t married.”

“Courcillion always loved you. It’s not a created or artificial bond. You seemed to have loved him. He followed you to the continent after the incident.”

“What incident?” I whine after hearing another cryptic bit of info.

“I don’t have the time to explain. You’ll find out soon enough.”

I ask the question that’s been in the back of my mind.

“Did I…” I swallow. I take a deep breath, not because I need to but because it’s a habit. “Did I love him?”

“You probably did, I can’t vouch for what was in your heart. But, you refused to see him when he came begging, apparently abandoning his family then. I was too consumed in assuring your safety.”

“Did you like him?”

“Maximillian is not just a Nephilim. He’s also a Psyche and human. That’s an incredibly rare trait. Only one other had it: His mother. But he’s not without his own abilities now. He loved you… apparently still does…more than he did before.” His words feel like an endorsement of Duke Courcillion, but he doesn’t say whether he likes him or not. I don’t have time to decipher it.

“You se
em to be endorsing him. Why didn’t I marry him then or didn’t want to see him when he came for me?”

“Not because you didn’t want to. You were prevented
from marrying him. You’ll find out the reason soon enough.” Prevented? By whom?

“Why did you make sure that Alex and I didn’t fall in love, but you didn’t
put the same wards against other men?”

“You were isolated most the time
, except on your fifteenth matriculation. It was just an oversight.” Somehow I don’t believe it was just an oversight. Marcus doesn’t do oversight. He seems to have planned fifteen steps ahead of Eden and Hades. He doesn’t do hindsight. I have to probe deeper.

“No, I think there’s more to it! I
also heard that Alex had a family that he lost in a fire…” I examine his expression carefully. My father’s face crumples as if he’s tortured. An involuntary shudder runs through him.

“
I…heard…He did…after I surrendered. If I was there, I would have prevented it! I love Alexander nearly as much as I love you. When the time comes, I want you to remember, there are bigger, more important things than you, me, Alexander or Courcillion. This is how it has to be!” His voice breaks. There’s a plea in his voice, a hidden apology, regret. But, for what?

“I love you dad, but
I think you are still making decisions on my behalf. I know you’re concealing something. I feel it in my soul! Please don’t make me hate you for the choices you are making on my behalf!” The look he gives me could be the same when Caesar saw his step-son delivering the final stab wound that killed him, ‘
e tu Brute?
’

“Don’t hate me baby…” his voice is pained, pleading. It cracks in the end. “No matter what you think of me, I always love you.
Always!”

“I don’t know what to
think, dad! Duke Courcillion whom apparently I once loved or at least liked enough to have been engaged to …” I say my voice raising an octave, “is supposed to be the one who is going to resurrect me, now. You made sure you put wards against any romantic attachment brewing between Alex and I. Well, guess what? Apparently your wards worked and directed me in the direction of another man. By all accounts, I ended up falling in love with someone else by your design. I don’t deny that I am attracted to the Duke, but it’s nothing like what I feel for Alex! Your choices put me in a bind!”

“You can’t, you shouldn’t love Alexander!”

“Why? He’s not the one for me? He’s out of my league? He doesn’t love me back? It’s only an artificial bond? Or all of the above? He couldn’t be evil. Otherwise you wouldn’t be putting him in my close protection or profess your fatherly affection for him.”

“
For none of those reasons. Trust me in this. Please,” he says extending his hands out to me, his chains rattle loudly.

“I’m about to leave and you’re not telling me anything!”

“It’s crucial that you wait till you get your full immortality.”

“When would that be? What if it never happens?”

“You are destined for bigger things… Some lives are more important than others,” he shouts. His words echo around his dungeon.

“At what cost
, dad? Everyone’s suffering because of me! Alex, Duke, many other people. And you… You say that my own mother died protecting me! How many more must suffer or die for me?”

“Your life is worth milli
ons upon millions upon millions! Do you have any idea, a clue how many angels I commanded? Nearly two million two hundred thousand angels! Here I am, shackled in Tartarus,” he yanks his chains rattling them. His voice echoes around many times. He opens up his wings in full. “Because your survival is worth every single one of them! We all have duties…” It would have been better if he hit me. His words wound me.

“Duties? I’m a duty for you? Without any delay, I’m releasing you of your duty, dad. Don’t love me or protect me because I’m a job! I regret that you have
suffered all this time, because you are tasked to protect me. Thank you for explaining it so thoroughly. I’m sorry I bothered you and caused you all the misery you had to endure. It was not intentionally done, but I’m ready to rectify my errors I have committed against all of you.”

             
“For God’s sake, Elissa! I don’t love you because it’s a job! You’re
my
child! I’m helpless but to love you. You’re a part of me. You’re the first and the last thought on my mind since you were born. I’m only…”

“…protecting me,” I finish his sentence. I approach him, and gently kiss his cheeks. I don’t want our goo
dbye to be like this. I hug him and tentatively, he holds me back. “I love you dad. Thank you for all you did for me,” I whisper.

“But?” he asks knowing there’s a ‘but’.
But, I release you
.

“Nothing,” I respond.

He takes my face in his hands, searches for a clue. “Promise that you’ll let those who are tasked to protect you continue to do…” I cut him off.

“…their duties?” I ask in a monotonous voice.
“We each have a purpose, right?” I say with a placid face. He narrows his eyes, perfectly aware that I have not responded to his inquiry.

“Yes.”

“Did I have two babies?” I ask catching him off guard. My father’s eyes widen. The surprise in them shows me that he knows.

“
Time’s up!
” Alex’s voice booms in my head. I feel being yanked out of my father’s arms. I claw at his wing to try and cling on to remain back. I need to get some answers.

“Where are they? Who was their father?” I shout, but I
have already been yanked away from his hold. He rushes after me to grasp on, but his chains halt him. I flail my arms to catch onto something, anything. I feel the pain of loss for children I may have had. Grief washes over me.

“No! No! No! Leave me here!” I scream.

“
Please baby! Come back! Don’t fight me! Please! We are running out of time! Duke will lead you, but I’m here to catch you…
” Alex pleads. The last vision I see is my father collapsing with a large heap of dust rising from the ground. He doesn’t bother to retract his wings; he simply buckles under his legs with his hands covering his face, shaking back and forth. I try to pull forward, but I’m yanked back.

“
Courcillion! Do your thing!
” Alex shouts. “
We are out of time!
” I feel ethereal easily slipping out of the gate of my father’s dungeon. I cling to something or someone under my hand who catches me.

CHAPTER XXV

TIES THAT BIND

A
lexander Aurelius Pella

“She’s snagged! Someone caught her!” I shout at Courcillion.

“Alex, that’s the worst possible time! The ties will only hold so long!” he says struggling. 

“Don’t tell me you’re
grappling. I thought you wanted to have a bond with Elissa and you’re already having a hard time carrying her. Do you really think you’re the man for her?” I mock to keep him engaged.

“I am
more than happy to carry her. I just want her retrieved. If I have to initiate her revival when she’s still down there, you know the ramifications!”

“I might briefly have to exit the bond to get her. She’s not responding to me and I can’t hear her. Can I trust you?” I ask.
Courcillion’s our only tie and I have to trust not only my life but my girl’s life to a man I have despised for over two hundred years! Talk about strange bedfellows!

“As enticing as the temptation is to leave you in Hades, I’d rather make sure Elissa’s body and soul arrive
because I will still need your help intact to revive her. I promise you on my honor that I will keep both of you safe!”

“Okay
. I’ll go into her psyche as far as I can to reconnect with her.” Physically moving in someone’s psyche is very much like climbing down a rope made of light. I can’t see the end of it, because it’s clouded. The descent is treacherous.

“Her temperature
has started dropping again Alex! I’ll do all I can to raise her temperature. How’s it going down there?”

“It’s like descending from K2!”

“K2? The mountain with the highest death to climber ratio?”

“One and the same. For every four climber
s who have reached the summit, one has died trying.”

“It couldn’t be that bad! You’re not dealing with steeper ice slopes, snow, avalanches, rocks, the unpredictable weather and the most treacherous ascent!” I know that he’s trying to keep me engaged and focused.

“Yeah well, the holy grail of mountaineering has got nothing over Hades. K2 has a thirty percent fatality rate. I have to beat the odds by going down as one and coming up as two. I have to have a two hundred percent survival rate.”