Immortal Mine (31 page)

“Who are ye?” she called. “State yer name,
now.” Sorley wanted to call to her, take the fear from her face,
but words locked within his throat. “Me ‘usband will be right
behind me, so I tell ye again: state yer name.”

“
Grá
,
” was all he managed.
Her face changed at the sound of his voice.

“Padraig?” Her voice was hesitant,
disbelieving.

“Aye.”

She stepped cautiously closer. Sorley knew
how he looked, six months without a shave or haircut, thin and
emaciated from the constant hunger, his clothing hanging like rags,
covered with blood.

As she reached him, she bent down, axe still
raised in preparation, and peered into his face. As she caught
sight of his unusual eyes, her own widened. She gasped and flung
the axe to the side, launching herself at him.

“Padraig!” she
screamed, her enthusiasm knocking him back. It was only with great
effort that he was able to keep them from falling to the
groun
d. “
A chuisle mo
chroí
.
Buíochas le Dia
.
Fáilte ar ais,
céad míle
fáilte
, m
o
shíorghrá
.”

Sorley simply held her, crushing her against
his chest as tears of gratitude slid down his face.

I have no words as Sam tells his story. It’s
as if he’s telling me a fairy tale, something not real, and yet the
emotion on his face as he speaks of the fighting, of leaving his...
wife
... and then returning to her when he should have been
dead, speaks of the truthfulness of his words.

His wife.

Immortal.

I hug my knees to my chest. I feel as if
I’ve been lifted out of reality and plopped firmly into an
alternate reality full of pain and fantasy. I wonder idly if I can
find my way back to my reality, if my parents will be there
waiting, and Sam and Jean will be nothing more than my
imagination.

“For several years we lived hap—” He cuts
himself off with a glance my way. “We lived gratefully, without
knowing what I was. I stayed away from the fighting. I felt that I
had done my duty and that God had spared me for a reason, among all
those men who’d died around me. The wars raged on, especially when
the
D
easmumhain—
uh, the
Desmond’s, began their rebellions. But I didn’t care about politics
anymore, I just wanted to stay home and raise children, and try to
erase the horrors of war from my mind.”

“Children?” I gasp. His tortured gaze comes
to mine.

“We didn’t have children. I could no longer
have them once I was immortal, but of course I didn’t know that at
the time.” I feel the suffocating panic beginning to rise again at
his words. He can’t have children? I manage to push the panic back
to a manageable place.

“You can’t have children?
Ever
?”

“No, I can’t,” he says, watching me closely
at the disclosure of this information. I can’t decide if I’m more
upset for him for this loss... or if this should be
the
deciding factor for me of what to do about him. I always knew I’d
get married and have kids. If I stay with Sam, I won’t have babies,
or even anything resembling a normal life. I can’t think about that
right now. It’s too much on top of everything else.

“So, when did you... know?” I ask.

He looks away again, lost in his memories,
and it occurs to me that he’s lived a whole lifetime—several
lifetimes—before now. He
isn’t
seventeen.

“I can’t really pinpoint an exact
when
. There just came a time when it became clear that she
was aging, and I wasn’t. We went to see my parents when they were
quite old, because I hadn’t seen them for many years.” He pushes to
his feet, and I jump involuntarily at the abrupt movement. He paces
back and forth in front of me. “They thought I was a ghost, an evil
spirit. They called me the devil.” I wince at the deep hurt behind
his words.

“What did you do?” I breathe.

“I convinced them I was my own son.” He
laughs, but there is no humor in the sound. “They believed me, or
at least convinced themselves that that was the truth. We returned
home after a time. We lived far from anyone, so it wasn’t that hard
to keep the secret, even if we didn’t understand it.”

“Then how did you know? I mean, didn’t you
just think you weren’t aging?”

He looks at me again, and I can see a flush
of humiliation climb his cheeks.

“After she... died,” his voice catches on
the word, and I’m filled with a mixture of deep sympathy for his
pain, and burning jealousy that she can inspire such feeling from
him, even now. “After she died, I—” He swallows, but seems
determined to tell me. “I tried to kill myself.”

I can’t help the small intake of breath as
the remembrance of him turning the gun on himself in the motel room
invades my mind, and panic tries to push its way forward again.

“It didn’t work, obviously, no matter how
many times I tried, no matter how many ways.” He sounds bitter.
“After some time, I realized that I
couldn’t
die, though I
didn’t have a word for what I was.”

He comes and sits down near me again.

“What did you do after that?”

He takes a deep breath, and says, “I’ll tell
you if you want me to, Niahm. I’ll tell you everything.” He looks
away from me, a flush stealing up his cheeks. “I did a lot of
things during that time that I’m not proud of. I was angry—no, I
was
furious
. I didn’t know why I couldn’t die, which was
what I wanted more than anything. I’d rather not give you the
details,” he turns to me, “but I will if you ask it of me.”

I think about his words. Part of me wants to
know, is
desperate
to know, but a bigger part knows that
everyone has secrets, things they are ashamed of, things they don’t
want anyone to know, ever—me included. So I decide not to ask.

“You refer to her as ‘she.’ Your... wife, I
mean. What was her name?”

He hesitates as he gazes at the stream. I’m
beginning to think he won’t tell me when he looks directly at me.
“Niahm.”

“Yes?”

The slightest smile lifts his mouth. “No. I
mean, that was her name as well. Her name was Niahm.”

Shock filters through me. I examine it,
trying to decide if I should be angry or not. Is that why he was
drawn to me?

As if sensing what I’m thinking, he shakes
his head. “It has nothing to do with you, Niahm. I knew I was bound
to you before I knew your name. It was a shock finding out you
shared her name. I didn’t expect to find anyone
here
with
such a name.”

I remember back to when he first knew my
name, how I’d thought he was saying I couldn’t have such an exotic
name. Really he was simply stunned to find it out.

“Do you think of her when you say my name?”
I ask, bracing myself for the pain that will come if his answer is
yes.

“No.” At my skeptical look, he says, “I
can’t lie to you, Niahm. I don’t think of her. I did the first time
I saw your name, of course. That’s only natural. But you are
completely different than she was. And...” He leans slightly toward
me, one hand reaching out but then dropping before touching me.
“She never meant as much to me as you do. It might sound heartless,
but it’s true. I loved her. I won’t deny that. But with her it
wasn’t the same as it is with you.”

Not sure what to say, I blurt the first
thing that pops into my head. “It probably just feels different
because you’ve been alone for so long.”

“No, Niahm,” he says, shaking his head
firmly. “I’ve never felt about anyone the way I feel for you. Not
my wife. Not my parents. Not even Shane. Only you.”

His words cause a funny tightening in my
heart, but I’m still not ready for any of this... no matter how
much I want to lean into his arms right now.

“How did you find Shane?” I ask, clearing my
sore throat and changing the subject.

He watches me for a few moments, probably
trying to figure out how I can let his words pass without reply. I
feel a little bad about that, but I just can’t respond to him
yet.

“He found me,” he says. “And a good thing it
was, too. He saved me from myself. He’d been around for quite a bit
longer than me, and knew what we were. He’d been trying to keep
track of members of our family in case he found another who was
immortal. It took him so long to find me because I had been so
rural, and then had been on the move after realizing what I was.”
He pulls his knees up, looping his arms loosely around his legs,
looking at me with puzzlement on his face.

“What?” I ask defensively.

“You need to know...” He trails off,
contemplating. Then, making up his mind, he begins again. “You need
to know that there are immortals out there who aren’t... who
like
the fact that they can’t die, who feel like they are
above the law, I guess, above morality or consequence for their
actions.”

I shudder at his words as I recall my
thoughts the night before.

“And there are others—mortals—who hunt
people like me.”

His statement, given so nonchalantly, stuns
me.

“What? What do you mean,
hunt
you?”

He blows out a breath.

“The call themselves the Sentinels. They
feel, rightly so, that we are an abomination, and that it’s their
duty to remove us all from the earth.”

I just stare at him, trying to process his
words. There are people trying to
kill
immortals?
Deliberately trying to kill Sam?

“But... I thought you said you can’t
die.”

He looks away from me, watching the stream
that flows quickly by.

“I can’t kill myself. There are ways,” he
says, “that they know of. I can be killed, we all can.” He looks
directly at me. “Please don’t ask me to describe how they can kill
us.” I shake my head quickly, having no desire to hear of whatever
horrible thing might have to be done to kill someone who can
survive a gunshot. “They don’t care if you’re evil, or if you’re
just trying to live a decent life.”

His words recall his earlier statement.

“What did you mean when you said they
rightly
believe that you’re an abomination?”

He shakes his head, tucking his chin against
his chest. Just when I think he won’t answer, his voice comes, low
and quiet.

“How can I be anything but, Niahm? How can I
be one of God’s creatures, when I’m unnatural? I can only belong to
the devil.”

As angry as I am at Sam, as shocked as I am
by his having been married, I can’t let his statement go.

“Sam.” I reach out and lay my hand on his
arm, and his gaze moves to my hand before meeting my eyes. “I don’t
know why you are the way you are, but if there’s one thing I
do
know, it’s that you are
not
of the devil. You are
good, and kind, and pure. I don’t believe for one second that you
aren’t one of Gods children. Not you, not Shane... not even
Jean.”

He watches me closely, and while I can see
that my words don’t change his mind, I can see that he knows I’m
not just trying to make him feel better.

“You honestly believe that.” It’s not a
question, but a statement. His arm under my hand is warm even
through his sleeve. I wonder if that’s some kind of immortal thing,
how warm his hands and now arm always seem to be. Just as I move to
pull back, he covers my hand with his own. “I’m sorry, Niahm,
so
sorry for the brainless way in which I went about telling
you this. I didn’t fully consider how my actions would hurt you. At
my age, I should have known better, I should have taken the time to
think it through more thoroughly. Instead, I acted like the rash,
reckless seventeen year old I pretend to be. And because of that,
you’re suffering.”

Tears prick my eyes, and I don’t know
whether I want to punch him, or throw myself into his arms. I don’t
do either.

“If I could reverse time, I would take it
back. Not the telling you,” he clarifies, “I would still do that.
I’ve wanted to tell you for some time now. But I would definitely
do things differently.”

I swallow, not reaching up to brush away the
tears that manage to escape.

“That really was brainless, Sam.” He nods in
agreement. “Worse was that you lied to me for so long about Jean.
You knew her, but didn’t tell me.”

“I didn’t know her,” he says. “I didn’t know
she was your grandma, either. But I knew what she was. And I
thought she had come to harm you. I mean, what are the chances of
another immortal showing up in Goshen? Unless she’d come here for a
specific reason—and it seemed that reason was you.”