Fallen (11 page)

She tried to turn. She wanted to get away—but Lyon caught her hand and gripped it hard.

“Don’t run, Maddie. Whatever is stirring to life inside you—it must be important.” He tilted his head until his lips brushed her hair. “Tell me what you saw. What is it about this painting?”

Maddie stood stiff, beneath his gentle touch. “I felt something. This one is different. It feels
wrong
. That’s the only way I can describe it, okay? It breaks the pattern.”

“You see a pattern in the room?” She heard the slow release of his breath. “You feel that? You are very good, Maddie.”

She didn’t ask him to explain. She didn’t ask him to reveal more. This was her lesson and her test, and she was determined to get it right. “I can feel something. This one is small, but it seems bigger than the others. More powerful. Dense.”

She looked at Lyon, but he betrayed nothing. A very good teacher, she thought. Irritating, but effective.

“If it was a question of them being fakes, I would say the others were fake and this one was real. But in a house like this, every painting would be real. So it’s something else…”

Maddie moved closer. The exquisite scene perfectly captured the pink-gold light of a late summer afternoon. It wasn’t just about the artist’s skill. There was plenty of that, but every painting in the room showed a master’s hand. Maddie decided it had to do with feeling.

The feeling in
this
painting was so strong that she could almost reach out and touch it.

Unconsciously, she lifted her hand.

She had no idea what she planned to do next, but something about the painting or its energy pushed her away, almost as if it had a force and will of its own.

“I don’t understand. I keep trying to figure it out, but I can’t.”

“For once, Maddie,
do no
t think. The world is yours to control. But before you can control the outside, you must control yourself. That means using all of your mind, not just the small part that analyzes through addition, subtraction and comparison. You have to feel the world before you can control it.” Lyon’s eyes darkened. He knelt before her. “I want to show you something.”

Maddie caught a little breath as his hands gripped her leg and tugged her boot free. His strong fingers curved over the sole of her foot and then pulled off her sock. She felt a little hot wave of desire as his fingers curved over the sensitive sole of her foot and then along her calf.

“You have to stop thinking.
Feel
instead. Feel how your foot meets this wooden floor. These planks are at least five hundred years old. They came from an estate to the north, where they were hand carved and hand polished. There is a message in this wood and in the labor of these skillful people who made this floor. But you can’t think it or analyze it. You have to use your senses to understand it.”

Maddie took a deep breath. This was getting seriously strange. But he had been right in so many other things…

“So what do I do next?”

“Take off your other shoe for start.” Lyon tugged off her other boot, dispensed with her sock and massaged her insole before setting that foot on the cool wooden floor. “Close your eyes—and feel the veins of the wood. Feel the age of the trees that they came from. Feel the tired, strong hands that polished this floor. Feel it all. Force yourself deep until you can see every vein and burr.”

Maddie bit her lip and did as he ordered. As she drove her attention down, where the skin of her toes pressed against the cool floor, she had a flash of workmen with old wooden saws and string, marking the floor. She could hear the sounds of their tools ringing out.

“So you have seen it. Now make that image part of you. Hold it close. You can only control that which is part of you.”

Maddie didn’t move. Around her the house seemed to creak slightly and she had the sudden sense that it was listening. Waiting.

A dust mote danced through a bar of sunlight to her right. At the far end of the Long Gallery, the curtains seemed to flare out, though Maddie felt no breeze.

She looked down. The gleaming circles had closed tightly around her wrists, like braided silver coils that moved with sinuous energy.

The house seemed to be waiting for a response. Her own marks seemed to be waiting right along with everything else.

But waiting for what? There was still so much that she didn’t understand. Yet for Lyon’s sake, she had to get this right.

She tilted her head, letting the images unfold through her mind like a movie in grainy film. She saw the slow change of the sunlight coming through brand new windows, touching walls that had been freshly painted.

As the weight of that image from the past grew stronger, she felt her body relax, drawn into that world so deeply that her legs slumped. She would have fallen if she hadn’t braced a hand on Lyon’s back. Her fingers opened, sliding through his dark hair. And desire struck her again.

Lyon flinched. She felt his muscles lock as if he had read her thoughts.

When Maddie would have pulled away, he caught her hand and held it against his shoulder.

“That’s a start. Even more than a start. Now try the painting. Let its colors race through your blood. See what it has to tell you, Maddie.”

She raised her head and let the pink-gold sky of the painting wash over her, with the warmth of the summer sun and the love of a mother’s glance. Emotion swept over her in sudden waves. And then Maddie’s throat seemed to tighten.

Lyon stood silently behind her as if he was aware of the storm of her feelings.

“I can’t feel it. That kind of peace and love—it’s only in paintings. I’ve never had it, and my friends have never had it. Maybe there are some families that are good together. But even for them—it doesn’t last. Adults pretend that if you’re good everything can be nice and safe and happy. But it’s just a big con. People change. People lie. People
leave
.” She stared angrily at the exquisite piece of art while emotions broke over her, torn out of some deep forgotten memory. “This just makes you wish for things you can never have. “

She turned around with a little broken sound, and she felt Lyon’s arms slide around her. Gently he pulled her against his chest.

“Tell me the rest of it. Tell me how this painting touches you, Maddie.”

“It makes me feel angry. It makes me feel—” Her voice caught. “Betrayed. I never had that belonging, and I never
will
. I wanted it. I still want it, even now, after all these years.” She closed her eyes fighting against the old surging hurt and betrayal, thinking about all the things she would never have. How had Lyon guessed?

And was it remotely possible that somehow this beautiful, ancient house had sensed the forgotten pain of her past as well?

Maddie straightened her shoulders. “You wanted me to get upset and feel all these things, didn’t you? You wanted me to remember—even if it hurt.”

“To hurt you was never part of my plan. But the human soul yearns for light. Dark memories can only be buried at great cost and energy. We all have nightmares, Maddie. The only way to lay them to rest is to stop trying to bury them. You have come a long way toward that.”

“What do I do now?” She looked up and swallowed hard. “Tell me, Lyon. I want to be done with this past. It hurts me too much.”

“That is for you to decide. I can watch. I can help you. But you must choose.”

Maddie took a deep breath and forced her eyes back to the wall, back to the pink and golden light and the scene of ineffable love between a mother and child, all the while feeling hollow inside. Who had ever cared about her that way?

“I don’t want to be angry for the rest of my life, Lyon. It’s just…easier to be angry.
Hope
is what hurts because hope always gets betrayed.”

Maddie’s hands curled to fists. The empty, helpless feeling had returned. It whispered that she would never be free of her past, that it wasn’t something you rolled up and dropped outside with the garbage.

The loss and emptiness would always be part of her.
Nothing
could change that.

“What I ask from you is not forgetting but remembering, Maddie. Do this for me—and for the person you can become.”

Maddie caught a jerky breath. “There’s something else, something I don’t want to face.”

Her thin shoulders tightened. “I’ve always wondered if it wasn’t my fault somehow. Maybe I needed to be punished, and that’s why I lost everything good in my life.” And in the dark nights, when she was most alone and frightened, Maddie wondered if she hadn’t wanted to punish herself.

Lyon’s fingers opened under her chin and he raised her face up to his. “Do you really believe that, my heart?”

She forced herself to meet the honesty in his gaze, hotly aware of the endearment he had just used. How could she possibly focus when he said something like that? And how could she not want him to say it again?

Slowly the anger and despair drained out of her. “I don’t think everything that happened was my fault. Some was bad luck. I did do something colossally stupid—and I got caught. As far as my mother—her biggest mistake was in having me. She never should have gotten pregnant. I think… that’s why the painting bothers me.”

Maddie had never known what a family was or belonging meant. But now she opened her mind to the possibility of that uncomplicated joy and the sweetness of a summer afternoon when you were loved and safe and your world was complete.

She closed her eyes. She understood the painting now.

“Very good,” Lyon said. “You learn well. Perhaps too well.”

Maddie felt his shoulder muscles lock when her fingers opened on his back. She had never felt more intimate with another person.

Desire burned between them, but neither moved. Their thoughts reached out twining and binding together just as Maddie’s marks moved in restless circles.

Heat spiraled up through her body and she felt an exquisite rush of desire. She didn’t have very much physical experience with men, but she knew that when Lyon touched her, the experience would turn her inside out. He would be bound by honor and expect the same of her. He would give more than he took. There would be no room for lies or holding back between them. Could she accept that?

The silver marks drifted along his chest. Maddie saw a muscle tighten at his jaw as they skimmed lower.

Restless and hungry, just as Maddie had begun to feel.

Because the marks were
her
. And she needed to understand all the rest. Why was she here? What was she supposed to do with her life?

The silver rings flared up on her wrists and danced through the air. When they touched the canvas, the baby’s eyes seemed to glow the woman’s gown seemed to shimmer and the painting almost seemed alive. It called to her…

It wanted an answer.

Maddie took a deep breath, reached out, and moved her hand toward the priceless layer of pigment. And though it made no sense, her trembling fingers moved deeper—right into the canvas.

The painted surface seemed to shift. It drew away from her skin and parted like a whisper of cool silk.

Maddie stared at her fingers, unable to believe what she was seeing. Her hands seemed blurred and her fingers seemed to belong to a stranger.

She was pretty sure they didn’t teach
this
in any of her physics books.

“Do you want to help me here with some explanations? Because this is seriously starting to scare me, Lyon.”

Lyon put his hand on her shoulder. At his touch, Maddie felt grounded and balanced, not spinning off into a thousand directions. It was strange how he could do that. With one look, one word or one simple touch he put her world to rights. That probably meant something. Actually, it probably meant a whole lot. But Maddie couldn’t risk thinking about that too closely.

She took a slow breath, seeing the dim outline of her fingers behind the painting. “Lyon, this—is scary. I can’t be doing this.”

“Most certainly it is impossible for other people. For you—anything is possible. This is only the start.”

The force of what he was saying made Maddie tremble. There were some major laws being broken here, basic laws of matter and energy and protons. Even though her world was a wreck, it was the world Maddie knew. There had to be rules—if everything was broken, where did it leave her?

Her hands trembled, veiled inside the picture.

“Lyon—I’m afraid.”

She felt his arm slide around her waist. “Be calm.” And then his breath caught. He muttered something under his breath.

“What’s wrong?”

“A car. From the sound, I would say it is moving very fast. Since no one is expected and the viscount is gone, it can be only two things. One is the man you called on the phone. Izzy Teague. The other…” Lyon’s eyes narrowed. Maddie tried hard to focus, but the painting kept drawing her in. Against her will, her hands slid deeper, up to her elbows. Where her skin plunged behind the canvas, her nerves felt cold. For a moment, just the space of a heartbeat, Maddie felt her fingers touch over something.

“Lyon, there’s something inside there.”

“You are certain?”

Maddie closed her eyes, nodding, reaching deeper, even though it left her disoriented, separate from all that she was, caught between two worlds that should never be crossed and connected.

“We do not have much time, Maddie. Feel it, tell me what is there.”

The cold was creeping up her arms. It was like her visions of fog—only far, far worse. This was not a simple vision, but a state of matter that was tearing at her very being. “It’s too different. I don’t have words for it, Lyon. It’s beyond—almost like it’s turned inside out.” She closed her eyes, struck by waves of fear.

In the distance a motor growled, moving fast up the gravel driveway.

“Maddie. They are very close. Come back. Pull your hands free.”

“I—I can’t. My marks—they belong inside the painting. That is the place they come from, Lyon. I can feel it now. And they want to go back. To be home. It’s like you said.” Her voice caught. “They won’t…come back.”

Lyon moved behind her. “You must fight this thing.”

“Fight it h-how?” Maddie was fighting with all of her will. But nothing was happening. Didn’t he see that?

And, her hands and arms were like ice. The place—or dimension—whatever you called it, was draining her energy. Something told Maddie that was a very, very bad thing.

But whenever she tried to pull free, the force of her movement seemed to reverse, drawing her in tighter.

Could that be the key?

Lyon moved behind her. Maddie felt his hands slide around her wrist. The strong line of his chest was a reassuring anchor, the one point of balance in the nightmare of the room. “How can I help?”

“Just—touch me. Because I’m going to try something. Nothing else seems to work. I’m stuck.”

“Do what you must.” His voice was hard.

Okay. Time to get weird
.

Maddie took a deep breath, relaxing her shoulders and opening to the sensations in her hands and arms. She tried to pull backwards. Just as before, the motion seemed to kick her forward, in reverse.

So instead of pulling back, she leaned closer to the painting. She used the same amount of energy as before, except now she forced it in a shoving motion toward the canvas.

Nothing happened.

She forced down a wave of panic. Okay. So it wasn’t a simple reverse response. There was something else. Something she was missing.

You have to control yourself before you can control others
.

Wasn’t that what Lyon had told her? Maddie didn’t feel in control of anything right now, but she forced herself to try. Instead of moving jerkily, she sent her focus down to the wooden floor, to the old beams that she had seen so deeply a few minutes before. She spread her toes and wriggled them, driving her skin against the cool wood, making deep contact.

Control
.

Slowly she drew her focus upward, drawing power and balance from the floor, carrying that up through her body, all the time controlling her focus, grounding herself and balancing herself with every breath. A weight seemed to lift slowly from her shoulders as the energy rose. Something was definitely happening.

Down the hill Maddie heard the whine of a motor and the sound of tires crunching on gravel, but she refused to be distracted. Closing her eyes, she willed the power higher, through her knees, along her legs, up to her stomach. Her arms were almost frozen now, completely numb. She was pretty sure she didn’t have much time left.

Control
.

She willed the balance of focus up to her neck. She held it, nurtured it, reveled in it. And when it was as deep and complete as Maddie could manage, she sent that controlled focus back down into her arms, watching in disbelief as a faint arc of silver light sparked across the sheer surface to the painting like a voltage arc from a battery.

Her hands slid backwards an inch.

Control
.

She blew out a breath and focused again, drawing more power from the floor, up along her body to her shoulders, and then out along her arms.

Electric sparks hissed over the painting’s surface, and a dry, acrid smell of something burning filled the room.

Maddie really, really hoped that it wasn’t her
skin
.

She pulled her arms another inch free.

“That’s it, my heart. You’re doing it perfectly.”

Maddie felt the force of Lyon’s own focus, locked with hers. It helped, no mistake about it. But instinct told her not to rely on him or anything else.

This was
her
task, hers alone. She stared at the painting, letting her vision relax. She could see the outline of her hands now, ghostly and substantial. And yes, there was definitely a shadowed outline of something else inside the painting.

But she couldn’t take a chance on exploring further. The acrid smell was getting heavier.

She took a very slow breath and drew her focus into her hands, using the power and the balance from the floor—and finally taking more energy from Lyon’s hard body, locked against hers.

Her hands slipped free.

Maddie fell backward, into Lyon’s hard grip.

Shaking, she gasped his name, dizzy with relief. His hands locked on her waist and she heard him whisper rough words in a language she couldn’t understand, a language that sounded much older than Anglo-Saxon or Norman English. Then as her legs still trembled, Maddie tilted up her face and brought him down to meet her mouth, quick and hard and hungry, desperate to feel that they were both alive and the world still had order and rules and balance.

But there was no balance or order in the heat that slammed through her when Lyon’s tongue brushed hers and he whispered her name in harsh desire. There was no sanity when his hand opened, skimming lower, sliding under her shirt to find her breast.

She made a broken sound, pressing closer, needing more, wanting the mindless oblivion that Lyon would bring her.

Wanting to love and be loved. Every instinct told Maddie that this man would never fail her, would never betray her.

“Maddie, no. We should not.”

“Yes, we should. Touch me, Lyon. I never knew how it could feel. I’ve never
wanted
like this.”

She felt him shudder and remembered what Aeryx had told her. When Maddie looked down, her rosemarks twisted in a mad dance, shooting along her arms and then out to circle Lyon’s body.

They must be burning him. No matter how much she wanted their touch, Maddie could not bear to give him pain.

There was only one answer.

“Bind us, Lyon. I want you. I want to be linked with you.”

“No, Maddie.” His throat was raw, thick with his desire. “It can’t be reversed and you can’t go back.”

“I can’t go back anyway. My life will never be the way it was. And that’s probably a very good thing. I trust you, Lyon.
Bind us
. I heard what Aeryx said. I may not understand all of it, but I understand enough. You told me I have the right to choose, and I’m choosing now.”

Hunger filled his eyes. He cupped her breast and drew a harsh breath.

Maddie never knew what he would have said next, because an icy voice cut through the silence of the gallery.

“Let her go. Move away from her.
Do it now
.”

Maddie’s heart fell. She knew that voice. She knew its anger and harsh command.

Izzy Teague had arrived, and talk about a really lousy sense of timing. “Izzy, you don’t understand. He’s just—”

“Step
away
from her.” Maddie looked up. Izzy was holding a weapon of some kind leveled on Lyon’s chest.

And the cold, distant look in his eyes warned that he was just about to use it.