Fate Forgotten (14 page)

“You don’t want friendship.”

“If that’s the only way I can be in your life, the only way we can have one another. Don’t shut me out. Don’t give this up. Just—just sit with me.”

“I shouldn’t.” Every minute she spent with him, every word they exchanged was only going to make him hope, make it hurt that much more when she had to leave. It had been one thing when they were both married, but like this? When they had started as a romance?

God help them both, but she had enjoyed herself, flirting with him, teasing him. But it would never be enough. If she stayed, let him be part of her life in any way, how long until he convinced himself that taking more, insisting on more, was what he deserved—what they both deserved?

“Please, Evey.”

The bartender set her drink on the counter and she made no move to touch it, just stared at the liquid. Anything to keep from seeing the emotion in his eyes, from thinking of the warmth that blossomed inside her with his touch. How could it feel so right, so natural?

Adam picked it up, his other hand fitting around hers. “I won’t ask you to stay for more than this drink,” he promised.

When he tugged her toward a booth, she let herself go with him. Just a drink. To say goodbye. He deserved that much, and so did she. She slid across the bench, and he set down her drink, then sat beside her.

“You know, Mia told me once that you said love should be easy. That a person knew when they had found the one they were meant for.”

“There’s nothing easy about this, Adam. And it never will be. Not for us.”

“This? No. This isn’t easy.” She felt him studying her in the dim light and forced herself not to meet his eyes. “But when you were just Renata, and I was just Jeremiah, it was the easiest thing I had ever done. Surely that means something. Something important.”

She played intently with the drink, twisting the stem of the glass between her fingers. “Not more important than the world. What you want has always been impossible.”

“What I want is your love, Eve. How is that so impossible? How is that so wrong?”

“Love.”
Is that truly what you feel for me? There were times I wondered if you were capable of such a thing.

I wondered too, until I found you.
“You feel it. I know that you do.”

She didn’t respond, but picked up her drink and swallowed it in one long draught. It was time for her to leave. Time to say goodbye and walk away and not look back.

“I searched the world for you, Eve. I’m not going to let this stop me now.”

She laughed, the sound bitter even to her own ears. “And you wonder why I resist. Don’t you see, Adam? No matter what the risks, you’ll find a reason, convince yourself it’s for the best, that you’re not doing anything wrong.” Worse, maybe he would even convince her. She couldn’t take that risk. Not now, not ever.

“If it came to that, they would stop us. The angels, the g—on behalf of God. But you can’t tell me you haven’t ever even wondered what it meant that we were capable of this. You can’t tell me you haven’t asked yourself how you could love me at all, if God hadn’t meant for it to happen.”

Love. Was that why this was so hard? Because she wanted to love him? She closed her eyes. Now wasn’t the time to examine that feeling, to admit that it might be something more than just the chance to live another life as Eve. She pushed it away, stamped it down, buried it before he caught even the barest flicker from her emotions.

“How long will you stay after you realize I won’t be persuaded?” she asked softly.

“I’ll stay as long as you want me here.”

She opened her eyes and met his, cool and distant and steady. She had to be steady now. “And if I ask you to go?”

“You don’t want me to go,” he said. “Whatever else there is between us, that’s clear.”

He never had understood. Not really. “Sometimes, Adam, it isn’t about what we want.”

His jaw tightened, and he looked away, stared at the empty seat across from them.

And then he got up.

When he walked away, it took every ounce of her strength not to call him back.

Chapter Thirteen: 247 AD

With such protection in place, it wasn’t necessary for him to return to the House of Lions with frequency, but he did anyway, for Evaline’s sake, witnessing the birth of her son Lucius, and a second daughter, who Gaius allowed her to name Tora, for the life Eve had lived as Thor’s wife. Evaline made sure there was always a bed for him to sleep in, and wine and mead for him to drink.

After Gaius died, and the lands passed to Evaline’s son, Thor made sure to stop and see her every full moon. And before her own death, when he saw she did not have much longer left in this world, he stayed at her bedside for weeks, so that when she woke he could ease her suffering by telling her the stories she so loved, and when she was pained, he could give her dreams of times long past to distract her.

Her children and grandchildren always kept a bed for him, but he found that returning after Evaline’s death made his heart ache as much as watching Eve, and but for the times when he felt they were on the verge of forgetting who they were and what their history was, he did not return with the frequency required to form any family bonds with the House of Lions. They had his protection, and he ensured they had rain and sun for their crops, and an understanding of who they were, and who Eve was, but that was all.

“You take her death too much to heart, Thor. She was mortal. You knew the time would come. It is a wonder she lived as long as she did.”

He was in the grove, sitting on the ground and leaning against the bench which had somehow not yet crumbled to dust. Athena sat above him, and he felt her concern but could not bring himself to break the melancholy which had descended upon him and hovered for the last three decades.

“She was like a daughter to me, Athena. The only piece of Eve that I could touch.” And now it was one more piece of Eve he had lost. He shook his head and stared at the olive trees without really seeing them. This was why gods did not live among men. Why they lived on their mountains or in their cities in the heavens. Why they consorted among themselves for the most part, and did not form close relationships with mortals.

“You will forever want what you cannot have, won’t you Thor?” She said it with a sigh, resigned and even understanding. She slid to the ground beside him, and slipped her arm through his, resting her head against his shoulder. “I wonder how Ra did it, when he worked so closely with the Pharaohs. It must have pained him when they died. Do you suppose he sees it as a blessing or a curse that he’s starting to be forgotten?”

“I think Ra is old and tired and conserves his strength. But none of us will be remembered for much longer if the True God has his way. What does Zeus plan to do about the Christians?”

Athena’s laugh was bitter. “My father does not concern himself with them at all. How much harm can they do, he says. Look at how few the Jews are after so long, and how many our people are, he says. He convinces himself that this prophet Jesus will be forgotten before the cult grows any stronger. I’ve warned him that they have already written holy books, adding them to the Torah, but he thinks I worry too much, and reminds me that few people read.” She made a noise of disparagement, deep in her throat. “Does he not realize that it only takes one who can read to tell the story to the rest who cannot?”

He grunted. “It will be trouble for all of us if he’s wrong.”

“But less trouble than your Eve, and Adam her twin. There will always be people to worship us, Thor, but only if there is a world for them to live within.”

“She would never allow her brother to touch her.”

“How can you be so certain?”

He sighed, rubbing his face and then climbed to his feet. “I was her husband, Athena. I know her.”

“It was a long time ago. Perhaps she’s changed.”

“No.” He paced to the little spring and let his hands fill with water, drinking it as an excuse to keep his back to her. He didn’t want her to know how much her words upset him. How much it reminded him of Odin’s mistrust. So strong still that a hundred years later he was not permitted to return home. “This isn’t a question of changing. Eve cares about the world, and the people in it. She would not risk them. And the penalty for her is death if she did. She knows this. Even if she did not care, the personal risk is too great. She would gain nothing and lose everything.”

“She told you this?”

“She told me everything, Athena. Everything that mattered.” He took another drink, then straightened and turned to face her again. “She trusted me with all her secrets, though I did not trust her with mine.”

Athena was sitting on the bench once more, stroking the little snake around her wrist with a finger. “What do you suppose she thinks of the Christian cult?”

He sat back down beside her and shrugged. “It’s one of the many questions I’d like to ask. I cannot imagine it was easy for her to see her son martyred, though I do not know if she realized he was more than a man. I don’t think she recognizes immortality the way we can, and certainly she attributes the acts of the other gods to Elohim’s angels, so why not the miracles performed by Jesus as well? Just tricks, the lot of it.”

“Only a fool would not suspect something after he rose from the dead, especially after his ascension.”

“Perhaps she did. I didn’t stay long enough to bear witness, for fear that Sif would follow me. But she told me she never knew her God. That he had died with her creation. I don’t think she would believe that Jesus was anything more than a tool of the angels, and she had a healthy fear for them.” He grimaced. “I can begin to understand better why, after having met Michael. That creature has very little love for anything but the True God, and His law.”

“But you said that Gabriel was kind, that your impression of him was much more positive.”

“But how much of that was because he had been raised by Eve?” He shook his head. “I do not know what to make of the True God, or his angels. Or this cult. We’ll just have to wait and hope that your father is right that they will grow no larger.”

Athena sighed. “I suppose I cannot talk you into joining us for dinner tonight?”

“How much of your family is home?”

She made a face. “Hermes and Ares will not be there, if that is what you fear. But Aphrodite and Dionysus will. They’ve been asking about you. I promise not to abandon you, Thor. Nor will I let them refill your cup unendingly.”

Drink might do him good, at that. But he had been determined to avoid Aphrodite for the better part of the last century, since Sif had divorced him. Without the protection of his marriage, he had no hope of not offending her when he refused her advances. And no hope of not hurting Athena if he didn’t, though a woman in his bed would be a welcome relief. He’d been aching for one since that morning, long ago, when Athena had been nestled so invitingly.

“Please, Thor.”

“Perhaps another time.” He stood before she could tempt him any further. “I would not be very good company to anyone, I think, and I know Zeus hates when his feasting is not perfectly festive.”

Knowing it as an excuse, still she had the grace to let him go. Next time, he would have to accept, if only to avoid causing Zeus offense. The god had allowed him great liberty within Olympian lands since his exile from Asgard and Thor couldn’t afford to appear ungrateful. He couldn’t afford to alienate himself any further than he already had.

A god without people, a god without a home. A vagabond, an intruder. Sometimes he was even a thief. Taking apples, poaching game. He was everything Michael had said. And Frigg, the only mother he had ever known, and not even until he had already been more man than boy, told him this was how he was supposed to be. That wandering the earth was where he was meant to go. Odin was meant to exile him, and he was meant to ache. To feel this loss, this pain. To be alone. He was supposed to hurt.

It didn’t make him feel any better to think about what Frigg had told him. Turning it over in his mind just frustrated him. He wasn’t any closer to the answers or any kind of truth. It was just another way of wandering, and he grew tired of it. Tired of wanting what he couldn’t have. Tired of agonizing over the fact that Eve would suffer in the same way if he didn’t obey his father’s command. Tired of walking without a set course. Tired of balancing between all the other gods, between offense and inoffense. Tired of denying himself. Tired of living alone, and not understanding the reasons. Tired of all of it.

He slept in the trees that night. Somewhere in northern Gaul. Not quite on the edge of the Roman reach, but far enough away from the House of Lions that he wouldn’t be tempted to look for a bed there, and certainly distant enough from Mount Olympus that those gods would have to go out of their way to find him.

It rained, though he didn’t remember consciously suggesting it. The water soaked through his cloak and his clothes to his skin, clammy and cold, but he wasn’t made uncomfortable. In the dream he was in Syria, walking along a river. A man was baptizing people with water in the name of a god who would come. The water ran clean and clear and when he followed it on, Odin stood with Heimdall at a bridge. His father reached for him, clasped his hand, and welcomed him home. The river turned to stone as they crossed it, and he stared at the foundation of a hall larger than had ever been built in Asgard. He knew it was his own. The closer he drew to it, the more clear it became. Stones piled upon one another, and he felt the rock against his palms as if he had hewed them. When he reached it, it was complete, and he wandered the corridors until he lost count of the rooms inside. Finally, he reached his own chambers,
Mjölnir
waiting at his bedside, and a woman framed in the fading light of the window, her hair the rainbow of black oil. She heard him and began to turn—