Limerence II (8 page)

Until this moment, until her refusal, I hadn’t realised the depth of my emotions for Evan, but now that the choice has been taken away—now that she has made it clear we can never be—I know just how much I care for him.

He belongs to her. He believes it and she believes it, so where does that leave me? I can see so clearly how much he cares for me—perhaps loves me—and after this, I know I love him too

.

“You did what?”
I roar.

Mia at least has the graciousness to look worried by my anger, her hands subconsciously rubbing at the long since healed burn marks courtesy of Harley. The thought of his powerful hands on any part of her fills me with rage, and I can’t stop the grind of my jaw.

“I wanted to speak to her. Surely I’m allowed to speak to her,” she huffs. Her annoyance, worry, and sadness wash over me, stemming my anger. She looks up into my face and I can see that she is embarrassed, but as usual her stubbornness makes her refuse to admit that she is wrong.

“Of course you are allowed to speak to her, when you are called,” I grind out.

“I
was
called,” she snipes petulantly.

I roll my shoulders, needing to flex my irritation at something, needing to break something, or someone. Needing to release this coiled up anger inside of me. I look away from her, but it’s no good: my anger is still wild. “Mia, you were called because you provoked her, because you called for her. You painted for her, woman!”

She rolls her eyes, and stops rubbing at her arms when she sees me watching her.

“I suppose you wouldn’t believe me if I told you that I just thought it would be a nice painting for her wall?” She says, her mouth pinching in worry.

I throw my hands up in the air and storm over to the punch bag hanging from the ceiling by the back wall, and take my rage out on it for several minutes, until my skin splits and blood sprays around me, but I don’t stop—can’t stop. My anger and anxiety have skyrocketed—not just at Mia, but at myself. I should have foreseen that she would try something like this. I am, after all, the one who is supposed to be able to feel other people’s emotions, so surely I should have felt her mischievousness, or at least have known her well enough to know that she would try something like this.

I feel her hands slide around my waist, her touch warm and comforting despite my annoyance, and I can’t help that she makes those feelings begin to disperse. I want to be able to control this thing that is happening between us, but it seems uncontrollable, like the current in a river dragging me away from everything I have known and into danger. I stop hitting out, wanting to be breathless from the spent energy, but of course I am not. My knuckles are already healing even as I watch them, and then I lay my blood-splattered hand over hers. Her fingers lazily trace my taut stomach muscles.

“I’m sorry,” she murmurs. “I just wanted us to have a chance. I thought that if you wouldn’t fight for us, then I would.”

Her words sting me as if Harley himself had touched my dead heart with his poisonous hands, and I turn to look at her. “Do you think of me a coward, Little Mia?” I frown hard, both hurt and annoyed by the thought.

She’s staring at her feet, looking solemn and sad, her eyes rimmed in red, and it pains me to see her like this, but not as much as it pains me for her to think of me in such a lowly way. She shakes her head, the tears finally spilling free, and I swallow down the last of my annoyance. My hands grasp her shoulders and I push her against the back wall, tilt her face to mine, and claim her mouth for my own. She is eager and opens up to me at once, her hands roving to my back. I grab her hands and place them above her head, holding her in place as I steal kisses from her waiting mouth. Heat trembles through my muscles, her emotions wrapping and mingling with my own, and I push her harder, sucking gently on her bottom lip until she groans against my mouth and I feel her body quaking.

I pull away and look into her face, waiting for her eyes to flutter open so I know that she is listening properly. So I know that she understands exactly what I am telling her to be truth.

“I am no coward, Little Mia. I want you like I’ve never wanted another—”

“…then,” she interrupts, but I let go of her arms and press my finger to her lips.

“Shush, woman,” I growl out, “I am no coward, but I am a man of my word, and I promised my servitude to our queen. She did more than save my life, and for that I will always be grateful. Nothing can break that bond . . .” I look away, thinking of the Queen’s last words to me.

…I will take her head…

Would I stand by and let Mia be killed? Could I do that? I have given nearly a hundred years to our queen—almost a hundred years of my life to someone else—and I am prepared to give another hundred without question…until the thought of harm coming to Mia. So no, I realise, I will not stand by and let Mia be killed, but there will be a time and a place for that, and I cannot complicate matters between now and then.

I take a step back from her, needing space, needing to think. This is all such a mess. I rub a hand down my face and look back at Mia.

“Perhaps I should explain more fully to you,” I say, and she nods but doesn’t look up at me.

I take her hand and lead her towards my library—well, the Queen’s library, but one she has long since forgotten about, no doubt, since I am the only one in over forty years to enter it. Mia comes, reluctantly being pulled behind me like a spoiled brat, her footsteps dragging along the floor, a huff leaving her every once in a while. The entire time I pull her along with me, even though my head and heart are confused and full of worry and stress I can’t help but smile, a chuckle at her childishness never a breath away from my lips.

We reach the door and I unlock it and pull her inside with me, letting go of her hand only briefly to lock the door behind us before taking it again and leading her toward the chairs we had been sitting in previously. I push her into one and I take the other. And now we are face to face, and I must tell her my story.

“I am going to talk, woman, and you are going to listen. I will tell you why I am forever indebted to her, and then perhaps you will have a better understanding of everything—of me. Perhaps then you will know that no matter how much I,” her features perk up as I speak, “care for you, I will not break my vow. Perhaps then you will not think so little of me. I do not want you to interrupt and ask questions. Just listen. Do you understand, Mia?” I try to soften my features so I don’t seem as cruel, but it’s hard, because the truth is I have never told this story to anyone. And I have not spoken of it in nearly a hundred years.

I look to her and she nods, her anxiety rolling off her in waves and making me feel nauseous, but I press on regardless, my mind searching back for the beginning but only finding the middle.

“She was dead, my wife was dead.” I look at my hands clasped in front of me, shame and pity stopping me from looking upon her beautiful face. “That is all I kept thinking as I watched them ravage her slight body. She was dead, and they did not care. It had taken five of them to control me when they broke in at the dead of night and dragged us from our beds, and another two again once they had started to harm her.

While they decimated my wife’s body, our child cried herself into a frenzy upstairs, and I could do nothing.” My voice breaks as my mind sees my wife—her long flowing locks almost gold in colour, eyes as blue and as clear as water, a smile that would break any man’s heart—and I had ruined her. I grind my teeth against the pain of the memory, her beauty not justified by my mind. “I was a gambling man, and I was mostly a lucky man—until I was not.” I glance briefly at Mia and then look away as her eyes, full of pity, look back at mine. “I owed a lot. And I promised things I did not have and could not deliver. When I didn’t win—when I couldn’t pay what was required—they made me pay with my wife. They came one night while we were sleeping, dragging us from our beds, and forced me to watch as they tore her apart, man after man, until her body could take no more, and her mind gave way, and her body gave up.” I clutch at where my heart should be, feeling the biting sting of utter devastation as if this was happening now. “Then they were to take my child.” I look up to meet Mia’s eyes, needing her to see and understand. “They said they were to raise her to work in their brothels, that she would be reminded of why she was there until her death, and that she would know that it was my fault and that I was to blame for her ruin.”

I stand, not able to stay seated any longer, the room growing smaller around me as I talk. “I begged them, pleaded, offered myself—my life—but they didn’t care, not these men. They had destroyed my wife and they would destroy my daughter, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. With all my strength, with all my skill, I was still incapable of stopping them, incapable of saving my family.” I grit my teeth and slam a fist against the bookshelf, sending books cascading to the floor. Mia jumps out of her seat but keeps her distance from me.

“And then our queen was standing in my doorway. Of course, she was not my queen then. To me, she was just a woman—her hair as black as ink cascading down her back, her eyes as cold as ice. She asked me to invite her in, and for a moment I thought I was delirious, that I was the only one to see her, to hear her, and that this was my punishment—for when she spoke, her mouth had two fangs hanging from it. I stared at her as the men went and fetched my daughter, stared at her as she calmly repeated over and over to let her in, but I stayed silent the entire time, feeling numb—feeling death on my neck, and welcoming it. As they brought my tiny daughter into the room, her cries almost deafening, I mouthed words that I will never regret until I finally leave this world.

“I invited her in, and with her came much bloodshed and death.” I look across at Mia with a haunted smile. “Rivulets of blood ran the length of my house when she was done, and as I lay next to my wife’s dead body, and cradled my child in my arms, she—this woman of nightmares came to me and spoke again. I promised her my loyalty forever if only she would protect my daughter forever.” I walk back to my seat again, and Mia does the same, as I drag my chair nearer to hers, drawing us closer together.

“Mia, she refused this promise, instead giving me the power and strength to protect my daughter for myself by making me vampire, and I did. I watched her grow and marry, and have children of her own, and to this day I still guard and protect her offspring.” I look down sadly. “I am a grandfather of some unfathomable greatness now.” I smile sadly again. “But I have never spoken to any of those children. Instead I watch them from a distance, and protect them, always.”

Silence fills the room, echoing around us like a black abyss. I don’t know that I expected her to say anything, or that there is anything left to say between us. I have shown her my ugly side, the side that I do not even like to admit to myself, the side that is so dirty that an eternity of washing could never make me clean again. I am the cause of my wife’s brutal murder, I am the reason my daughter grew up without a mother and father, believing that she was abandoned on some church steps like an unwanted cat. I am the reason for my own downfall.

I am an ugly, filthy man.

I hang my head in shame, refusing to cry because I do not get to accept the pity or sympathy that is rolling from Mia, because this was my doing and I will pay for it for eternity—and I deserve to.

I feel the urge she has to hold me, to pull me close and wrap her kindness and her warmth around me, but I refuse it, and she is aware of this to some extent for she never tries to do either thing. Instead she waits, staring at me, as if waiting for me to say something else. But there is nothing else to say. What other words can I use to express the deep debt that I owe to our queen—a debt that I shall forever pay, because I have seen what happens when a man does not pay his dues?

And I will never make that mistake again.

I lie on my
bed, staring up at my ceiling—well, not
my
ceiling, but
the
ceiling. Because nothing feels like mine anymore. Not this room, not these clothes, not this body. And certainly not this stupid heart that, even though it's dead, continues to cling to the idea that I can love and be loved.

Evan has avoided me since our talk, and in some ways I guess I have been avoiding him too; not because of what he told me, but because the stupid and selfish part of me understands why he can’t be with me but still wants him—the part of me that still pines for him, still yearns for his touch, his lips and his hands on me. But I understand now that he will never give in to those urges. Not now. Not ever. And with remorse I will accept that, because I understand him now and I understand his loyalty to the Queen and what it would cost him to take that loyalty back.

It hasn’t helped that my stupid inner vampire is intent on making everything worse by mocking me at every turn. Since the talk the other night she has been livelier than normal, and I have been less aware of her until too late. It seems that she is intent on ruining this whole experience for me. Well, not experience, but life…or death, or whatever you want to call this. No matter what I do lately, she’s constantly there at my heels, nipping away and sucking the fun out of everything with her mind games.

I realise how crazy this all sounds, even if I am only thinking these things and not saying them out loud. After all, how can my inner vampire, who is in my head, play mind games on me? Surely by definition that’s impossible, and massively unfair.

I hear the telltale sound of the door at the end of the hall being opened and closed, and then footsteps walking swiftly towards my room. I know they are coming to my room because…I don’t know how, I just feel it. Like you can feel when someone is watching you, the constant caress of eyes over your flesh, and you turn but don’t see anyone there, but you know that someone was staring.

Before the sharp knock comes at my door, I hear it and I’m up and at the door, opening it wide as Evan’s large fist is about to come down hard on it. He looks put out that I answered it without him knocking, and with a frown he looks away, back down the hallways from which he just came.

“No need to greet me with a smile,” I snap. I’m really not in the mood for temperamental vampires tonight, handsome or not. Plus I’ve found that being a bitch is far easier at dousing both of our desires than being nice. So bitch it is.

He looks back to me, the frown deepening. “You answered your door.”

It’s my turn to frown now. “I did.” I point towards his clenched first. “Was I not supposed to answer? Is this some new form of torture from you?” I scowl.

His frown dissipates and turns into a wide smile. He unclenches his hand and cracks his knuckles. “Torture? You think I torture you?” He chuckles, the deep rumble coming from within his chest.

I roll my eyes. “Well, whatever. What do you want from me, then, since you didn’t want me to answer my door? Should I close it and let you stand out here listening to me dying of boredom in my room?” I goad.

From somewhere deep within this great hunk of vampire a low rumble starts, and before I can grasp what is happening, he laughs—a loud, deep, bellowing sound that echoes down the hallway. I stand staring, perplexed by how frustrating he is, and then my mouth turns up into a slow smile and I begin to chuckle too. How can I not? He laughs and laughs, his head thrown back, his hair haphazard around his shoulders, and the harder he laughs, the harder I laugh. This is the most I’ve ever seen him let go before, and it relaxes me enough that I feel I can let go. Gone is the frustrating, rigid warrior of a vampire that I have come to know and perhaps like too much, and in his place is a man, who is laughing. A man who seems relaxed and perhaps even content.

I laugh again, feeling silly and girly, and after several minutes of us both standing in the hallway laughing uncontrollably for no reason at all, I dab at my eyes and wipe away a few stray red laughter tears. My laugh dies off, and when I look back up he’s staring at me. I stare right back, waiting for him to say something; but after a moment when he is still quiet and staring as if brooding over some deep inner turmoil, I break the ice.

“Why are you staring? Do I have something on my face?” I try to laugh half-heartedly, but the moment is gone.

“No, you are perfect, Mia,” he says, his voice like gravel.

I swallow down the lump in my throat, feeling awkward, aroused, and anything but perfect. “Says the Thor wannabe over there,” I remark pointedly.

He chuckles again and shakes his head, looking down to his feet. His hair is loose tonight, hanging about his shoulders like a black cloak. Long hair was never my thing, but on Evan it is more than just a little bit attractive, and the urge to run my fingers through it is ridiculous.

“Well?” I ask, nervous about my own thoughts, but determined not to let on how he makes me feel. I regain my composure and put on my best poker face.

“I do not know who this Thor is, but if you look at him the way you keep looking at me, then it makes me want to destroy this other Thor so that I am the only one who gets that look.” He looks back up at me through his dark lashes, and if I had a heartbeat it would most definitely skip a beat, because without a doubt he’s being serious, and I don’t know what to make out of his words.

I flounder for a moment, losing my cool under his heated words. I never was much good at poker. I clear my throat, trying desperately to think of something to say. What does one say to that? I look away, not entirely embarrassed but most definitely feeling hot under his intense gaze. I feel
her
inside me, looking up in interest, and I do my best to block her out. She rolls her eyes and curls back up, falling back to sleep again.

I continue to stare at him open-mouthed, still unsure what to say next. He reaches out and takes my hand in his. “I came to you tonight because I want to take you into the town. I want you to see that you are stronger than
her
.”

Evan continues to look at me, his body showing all the signs of having total confidence in me, but he forgets that I can see his aura. I can see the crack in his cool and calm demeanour—his invisible tell, so to speak. The fact that I can see his doubt angers me, even though I know he’s only trying to help.

I stare back at him through narrowed eyes, pull my hand free from his, and lean back against my bedroom door. “After what happened last time?” My body is rigid with annoyance, irritation, and something else. Anxiety, perhaps. “So, you’re not worried at all? It doesn’t even bother you that I may lose control again?”

“Mia.” He places strong hands on my arms, his long fingers wrapping around my biceps and applying just the smallest amount of pressure, and stands me up straight. His tongue flicks out, running slowly across his lower lip as he looks down at me, though I’m not certain he realises what that action does to the butterflies in my stomach. “Do you trust me?” he asks, his brown eyes boring in to mine, and a reluctant smile crosses my face.

I nod, and he reciprocates my smile with one of his own; but unlike mine, his is large and breathtaking, reaching all the way up to his eyes.

He takes my hand in his again, his unnaturally cold fingers somehow magically feeling warm in mine. I look down at our hands entwined, seeing tendrils of colours wrapped around them as if binding us together in this moment. It is mesmerising to watch and I lose myself in the moment as I stare.

“What do you see, Mia?” he asks quietly, his voice deep.

I look back up at him. “Nothing,” I reply quickly, possibly too quickly, and look away, staring down the length of the hallway into the darkness. No one ever turns lights on around here; it has always been an annoyance from my very first days here. The simple act of turning on a light and illuminating the darkness somehow makes me feel so much more human, and so much less homesick at times. Perhaps that is why we are not allowed. We are forced to embrace our dark sides and bid goodbye to our previous existence. Melancholy settles over me and I sigh deeply.

“Evan, why is it that all emotions are so…heightened? Why must we feel everything so intensely?” I grumble, still unwilling to look at him.

“That is just how things must be. It is worse for you, for you are Bastion. You are powerful, or you will be when you learn to control that little vixen inside of you.” He chuckles, as if we are talking about something innocent and not a murderous wench trapped inside my mind.

He pauses and I turn back to look at him, an emotion crossing his face that is gone before I can work out what it is. “Let us go,” he says, his accent strong. “How do you feel about running?”

“Running?” I reply with a small laugh.

“Yes, it’s about time we flexed out some muscles other than just your fighting ones. You have yet to experience your speed. You can run very fast now, Little Mia.” He smirks at me, knowing how his nickname irritates me.

I smirk right back. “Do I need to run from something?”

“There will always be someone chasing you.” His words are dark, yet the meaning is tender. “And always someone for you to run to.”

A shiver works its way up my spine, yet I am not cold. Evan sees it—sees the thrill work its way through my body—and he smiles again, another one of those breathtaking smiles that makes my stomach flip. My own smile falters and I wonder what all these emotions mean, because we cannot be more than we are—teacher and student; he has made that clear. Not that I would want anything more from him, but then these intense feelings are just that—intense, and sometimes difficult to ignore. A downside to my new existence. Things are never just a single feeling anymore, but a full-on overexposure to every emotion possible. And always as if the dial has been turned up to full with every one of those feelings.

So this between us is difficult, and sometimes uncomfortable, but I could not deal with everything without him. Could not have dealt with everything that has happened to me the past six months, and so we ignore those feelings, not wanting to ruin the friendship that we have.

Friendship? Evan is my friend, and nothing more.
I swallow that thought down bitterly.

“Then let’s go,” I say cockily, wanting to break the intense moment that has somehow worked its way between us.

I pull my hand free from his and before he can reply, I begin to run. The hallway rushes past me, dark wood-panelled walls, crude artwork, and cold stone floors, everything moving unexpectedly quicker than I thought possible and catching me by surprise. The doorway is coming up straight ahead and I hesitate for a split second, wondering if I can stop in time to open the door, or if I should push straight through it. Evan passes me with a loud laugh, and slams into the door and is out in the fresh air before I can blink. I laugh and press on harder, willing my legs to run faster, until I, too, am pushing through the swinging door, and I’m outside, and the world is a blur around me.

I can’t see Evan—he is too far in the distance for me—but I can see his aura trailing brightly behind him, and I can smell him. Dear God, I can smell him like something crazy. His scent is filled with raw hunger and passion, wild spices and vanilla, all mixed together to make the most manly scent I’ve ever smelt. It’s delicious, and I wonder why I have never smelt it on him before. I wonder why and I hungrily chase after it, wanting to wrap my body in the smell of pure masculinity that is Evan.

I will my legs to move faster, pumping them harder, feeling my muscles stretch and contract with each step until my feet barely touch the ground and the air is almost still around me I’m moving so fast. I stare around me in amazement as I run, the act of running at such speed easier than I would have imagined. And becoming easier the more I do it, until it is merely a thought process instead of the choice of moving my limbs. I will them to move, will the world to slow and my body to speed, and everything complies, every dot connects to make it happen for me. A laugh escapes my lips as I stop thinking and am just doing.

Animals’ eyes glow at me from the trees, leaves fall slowly, almost like a freeze frame in the air. An owl swoops down from a tree, and I run and watch it in awe, its beating wings barely perceptible to my eyes as I move at such speed. It watches me before flying past and plunging down to the ground to grasp a mouse between its talons. I gasp as it passes me carrying its prey and then I’m gone and the owl is out of sight, and I am still following Evan’s colourful trail, his delicious scent burning though my very core.

I see him up ahead; he’s stopped, waiting for me to catch up, and I begin to slow as I get closer. His arms reach out for me as I near, and then they are around me, pulling me close to him even as my legs still continue to run in the air, until I can will them to stop. I’m not out of breath, yet I feel breathless in his arms. His heart does not beat, yet I swear I can feel the frantic beating of his heart in his chest as he holds me close, his arms my safe haven.

“Evan, that was . . .”

He dazzles me with another smile. “I know.” He takes my hand and pulls me towards a gap in the woods. “We are here.”

“That’s impossible. We’ve only been running for few minutes—we can’t be close enough to the town yet.” I look around us, back the way we came, and can see nothing but trees for miles around. I look up into his face, unsure. I don’t like feeling uneasy like this. I’ve felt safe at the castle since I came here, and everything made some sort of sense to me, but this doesn’t. And blood—I can smell so much blood, so close. It makes me thirsty, yet I can control it from this far—control myself.