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Crace stopped walking. “A mortal with wings? But … that’s impossible.”
Greaves fell still. “The very same thing I said about Alison when I learned of the extent of her abilities. But come, let us see Harding. He will desire sustenance by now as well as a reason to overlook our little invasion of Endelle’s palace. And if you like, you shall have sustenance as well.”
Crace shuddered.
Yes, he would like sustenance.
Yes, indeed.
A good friend speaks what no one dares to say.
—Collected Proverbs, Beatrice of Fourth
Chapter 22
Alison cut the tags off a new silk blouse, a green blouse she had purchased earlier at a pricey Scottsdale Two shop. She had worn a similar blouse the night she had first met Kerrick, the night she had been introduced to the world of ascension, to the world of the vampire.
A sob caught in her chest. She willed away the spasms yet the tears remained. They fell, streamed, ran down her face. Her nose was a mess. She kept blowing her nose, shaking her head, cutting off tags.
She had erred and she didn’t know how to make things right, how to move forward.
Havily had let her stay in her town house, in the spare room, just as she had once promised. Alison had needed new clothes, so she had gone shopping. Such a normal thing to do, especially after she had almost killed her boyfriend.
Her throat hurt. More tears splashed all around the bedroom.
Three days had passed. She had spent three days at the hospital, chained to Kerrick’s bed, willing him to get better hour by hour, even after the chance of his dying had long since passed. She had willed his healing to improve, she had begged Horace to come to the hospital and use his healing powers, she had consulted with the surgeons, she had gone to the hospital chapel and begged the Creator to speed his healing, to make him well, to make things right, to erase the past, demolish the night of her ascension celebration, to forgive her, forgive her, forgive her.
Kerrick would live. After taking a hand-blast to the abdomen, he had come back from the dead. He’d survived surgery. He would live to fight another day.
Now she bent over a pair of DKNY jeans, her favorite. Tears plopped, darkening the denim in grief-stricken polka dots. She cut off more tags. She hiccuped as she straightened. She folded the jeans over a hanger. She shoved the hanger into the closet. Looked at all the new clothes. She whipped around and folded more tissues from the box in the bathroom. She sounded a horn with her nose and wiped. She wiped some more.
Kerrick had almost died.
The thought broke her. She dropped to the carpet between a double bed and mirrored closet doors. Great rolling sobs charged out of her body. Heavy waves of grief and regret punched the air.
What a fool she had been to have thought Second Earth would be different for her.
Havily appeared in the doorway. She rushed forward and called to her in a sweet repetitive flow of words, “No, no, no, no, no.” She dropped beside her and surrounded her with her arms. “Don’t cry, ascender. Don’t cry. He lives.”
“I almost killed him. I almost killed him.”
“He lives.”
“He died.”
“You brought him back.”
Alison rocked.
Havily rocked with her, whispering tender words in her ear, “He lives, he lives, he lives.”
Alison hiccuped again. She honked into the tissues. She rocked a little more. She shifted toward Havily and met her gaze. “I can’t be with him, can I?”
“Of course you can.”
“No, I can’t. I have too much power. I should have known. I should have known.”
* * *
Havily folded a fresh tissue from the bathroom and wiped Alison’s cheeks. She thought, I feel this way, too, like I could fall on my face and sob like a baby.
She shouldn’t feel so desolate, not after what happened, not after Marcus had morphed into a crazed beast, not after he’d tried to have his way with her against the wall of the third rotunda of Madame Endelle’s palace, right in front of the Creator and everyone.
She didn’t understand her attraction to the man at all. He was the antithesis of what she desired for her life. She wanted a man who felt as passionately about Second Earth as she did, about desiring to make a significant contribution to the improvement of society and certainly to the ending of the war.
Warrior Marcus—and surely he didn’t deserve the appellation warrior—knew little of selflessness. He had only aided the warriors by order of the Supreme High Administrator.
No. Warrior Marcus was not worth even one thought, let alone the thousand she had spent on him since she had first caught his fennel scent at the Cave.
Now he was gone. He’d returned to Mortal Earth for good.
Tears fell from her eyes, soft streams of incomprehension.
“I’ve made you cry,” Alison wailed, her sobs coming harder.
Maybe weeping was infectious. The trouble was, Havily didn’t understand the source of her anguish except she kept remembering Marcus, weighed down by Luken’s mountain of a warrior body, his arms shaking as he crawled toward her, trying to get to her. He kept calling out, Havily, I’m coming. I’ll protect you.
The tears flowed faster, harder.
Marcus had left late that night, after Horace had healed him, after he had begged the warriors to forgive him for his unconscionable behavior. He hadn’t even come to see her, not even to apologize … although, she hadn’t wanted, expected, or needed an apology because she had been an oh-so-willing participant in his I-must-have-you-now assault.
She folded more tissues from the bathroom. She handed over a little stack but kept a similar thick wad for herself. She blew her nose.
When Marcus had pinned her against the wall, she hadn’t been frightened, not in the least. Surprised, maybe. Hungry for him … oh, God, yes, so hungry.
Maybe she’d been celibate too long. After all, she hadn’t looked at another man, hadn’t been remotely interested, in fifteen years. Her mission had consumed her waking hours. The belief she could make a difference in the war through administrative restructuring had replaced romantic love, had become her raison d’être, her purpose, her lifeblood. She didn’t need love. She didn’t want love. Truly.
Then Marcus had come and in three days, he had shattered the simplicity of her life and all because she wanted him. She wanted him with a ferocity that now commanded even her dreams.
So she wept.
* * *
Kerrick reclined in his hospital bed. He detested being stuck in the sterile environment because it spoke of weakness and vulnerability, two things a warrior could never be. Worse, he’d had time to think.
