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"What have you been doing?" Mina demanded.
"What do you mean?"
"The Dark Ones were loose and swarming about the ocean floor, seeking one of the winged ones. And it's all over you, his aura. You are fair glowing with it." Mina was already rummaging through her stores, reaching into crevices in the rock used for storage for her healing tonics and potions.
"He said I would be safe as long as I wasn't with him."
"Idiot."
"Mina," Anna gasped. "He's an angel."
"And an idiot. Here, drink this quickly. It will purge you and you'll be rid of that glow. Go on or I'll pour it down your throat."
Anna hesitated. "What do you mean, purge? Not . . . forget?"
Mina stopped, stared at her. "No," she said at last. "It's a cleansing, not a . . ."
"Cleansing. How . . . Does that mean . . ." He'd said he could voluntarily withhold his seed, but what if . . .
Mina peered at her. Now her gaze traveled more slowly over Anna, apparently seeing far more than auras.
"Anna, you lay with him."
"It was necessary, to heal him. He used Joining Magic." And then, inexplicably, Anna burst into tears.
"I don't know why I did that," she said at last, when she was able to get herself under control.
"Crying in the ocean is a sad metaphor," Mina said cryptically. "And you do know. I see it all the time in those pathetic creatures that slink to me for love potions. You're feeling this wonderful yearning, but it makes you hurt at the same time. Like you've glimpsed the meaning of the universe, but you already know you can't hold on to it. It's mocking you. So tell me the full story, beginning to end."
Anna complied. She knew Mina enough to know the futility of arguing with her cynical assessment or taking affront at being lumped in with the "pathetic creatures." While she didn't dwell on their coupling, Mina asked her more questions about that than was comfortable, gazing at her with typical discomfiting shrewdness with her one visible crimson eye. The rest of her face, like most of the features of her body, was shadowed in the cowl and floating tendrils of that cloak, though Anna could see the pitted scarring that covered her cheek and jaw beneath the glittering eye.
When she finished, Mina raised a brow. "He had to use Joining Magic. It was the only thing that would work," she mimicked. "Oh, that's rich. If I had an anemone for every time I'd heard that one . . ."
"Mina . . ." Anna let out a startled chuckle at the acid comment, but then shook her head. "I don't know if I can get him to leave."
The seawitch cocked her head. "Enamored of you as all that, is he?"
"No. No." Anna blanched. "Goddess, he's an angel, Mina. I'm not as daft as you think. It's just . . . It's almost like . . . When I found him, he wanted me to leave him. Just let him die. Then I got him to the cave, and it's like he's not interested in leaving it. Ever. Can his wound have affected his mind? He doesn't even seem to want his own kind to find him. I can't explain it. It's wrong, is all."
"So he doesn't want to return to the skies. Sometimes people get tired of what they're doing and want to do something different, at least for a little while. Those humans you are so fond of--what do you call it? They take a holiday."
"No, it's not that." Anna lifted her shoulder in a shrug, gave an unhappy laugh. "Though I'm not denying that I could be a holiday. Was a holiday," she corrected herself.
Mina gave her an impatient look. "Do I have to hold your hand through this, like a child? Get past it. Relationships would do far better if they weren't tied up with sex. Sex should be as basic as eating or shi . . ."
"Don't compare it to that."
"See what I mean? If it was just a bodily function, no one would get confused about whether or not they were in love. It wouldn't have anything to do with the body. Most of the potions I give are to simply deaden the sex drive. That tells people instantly whether they're thinking with their hearts or their hormones."
"I'm going. You're just making me depressed."
"It's never stopped you from hanging about endlessly before. And we're going back to see him now, anyway."
Anna bit off her irritated retort. "What?"
Mina rose and began to rummage through her stores again, tucking things away in the cloak. "You're many things, Anna. Impulsive, too open and loving. But you're not daft. Not in the least. The Dark Ones will be back very soon. They know he's still down here. And there's nothing the Dark Ones want so much as a captured angel."
"Why? To kill him?"
"No." Mina shook her head. "Far worse than that. To cut him open and take the Lady's power that resides in his chest. It would increase their own power exponentially and make his will their slave, as long as they hold his heart. He would fight for them."
Anna gave her a horrified look. "Why didn't you tell me sooner? He could be in danger. He could--"
"I wasn't going to tell you at all." The seawitch shrugged. "It's not our concern. But then I figured you'd hear about it when it happened, and you'd be hanging about here again, blaming yourself and spreading your guilt heavy enough to suffocate me."
Anna counted to ten, figuring it would not be productive for her to reach out and try to strangle the witch. "So you're going back with me, because?" she asked between gritted teeth.
"Because without my help, you'll try to do something noble and stupid to save him and get yourself killed. Stay here. I'm going to go deeper into my cave and throw together some ingredients that may help him. Then we'll go evaluate his condition. If he won't go back to the skies, perhaps you can persuade him to go to the surface, somewhere not in the vicinity of where he originally landed. I can figure out a way to disguise him, not only from the Dark Ones, but from his own kind."
"His own kind? I don't understand."
"They're the best source of help for him, but he hasn't summoned them. Do you know why?" Mina asked it bluntly. "Angels are mighty beings, Anna, but that doesn't make them all good. You need to keep that in mind for your angel as well. He may be hiding for a reason that is not so angelic."
"No, he hasn't fallen from grace. I'm sure of it. It's . . ." Anna's brow furrowed. "You remember the male dolphin, the one whose brother was killed?"
"Yes. You followed him around the ocean, became his family until he was willing to integrate with a male pod again." Mina muttered something to herself and added another packet from her hidden stores to her person.
"He wanted to die," Anna said softly. "He saw nothing in the world to keep him. His loss hurt him so much, he just shut down, waiting for death."
"Your angel is not a dolphin, Anna." Mina shook her head. "Your capacity to love may be endless, but it can't always save the day. It's not going to be enough to save you, let alone everyone else."
Anna looked down, focusing for a long moment on the automatic, slow sway of her tail, keeping her stationary in the water. "Well then, on that day I'll no longer be a nuisance to you, will I?"
When she raised her gaze and met that of the seawitch, Anna thought she might have seen a flicker of regret, but she'd long ago learned her lesson about assigning regular emotions to Mina. "You may be right," she said at last. "But I must help him. When an angel falls out of the sky practically into your arms, how can that not be Fate?"
Mina gave a grudging grimace, turned away again. "Is he handsome?"
"Of course. I mean, he's an angel."
"His body . . . is it finely made?"
"Mina." Anna snorted at the glint in Mina's eye. Some of the tension loosened its band around her chest. "Now you're teasing me."
"I rarely get handsome, confident and powerful men in my cave. Never close enough to smell their skin, see their bodies move with such casual beauty." She was moving away into the recesses of the cave, the shadows swallowing her, but her voice still resonated. "The flow of muscle, the tensing of a buttock as they turn. The chance to stroke my finger down a line of ridged, tightly overlapping scales and find out what they conceal beneath them. Perhaps I simply wanted to know."
r /> The evocative image was startling, powerful, particularly in combination with the mesmerizing tone with which Mina murmured it. The words echoed through the cavern, vibrating in the water against Anna's body. Now she wasn't sure if Mina was teasing or saying simple truth. With Mina, one never knew. And she'd certainly turned the conversation in a different direction, distracting Anna from more troublesome areas.
"Well? Keep talking; I can still hear you." Mina sounded farther away, suggesting that there were a few more twists and turns in the mysterious recesses of her home.
"He is very finely made," Anna said cautiously. Then the images Mina had painted spurred her own and she couldn't help herself. "Oh, Mina, I've never . . . He's so large and powerful. All of him is firm muscle. His arms and legs . . . His shoulders seem as broad as a ship's timbers. I know all angels are probably like that, but somehow, I just know he is more handsome, more beautiful than all of them. Goddess help me."
Mina reemerged, and her red eye blinked once, holding a wealth of things Anna couldn't decipher. "I don't know if the Goddess will help you, Anna. But I'm going to."
