22
As soon as I shut the door behind me, I sensed another’s energy in the apartment. I didn’t turn on the lights.
Inhaling the vanilla cinnamon scent of Emma’s skin in the apartment, a storm of conflicting wants and desires raced through me.
“You could pull your sword out. Try to run me through,” Emma said in the darkness of our apartment. I waited two heartbeats before responding.
“I’m not going to do that.”
A light clicked on. She was sitting in the reading chair, facing me. I locked the door behind me but didn’t move any closer.
“They’re looking for you,” I said. She didn’t bother cloaking the darkness now. I could easily see the expanse of energy extending ten feet out from her body. A mix of dark hues and bright reds swirled around her. Evil was inexorably entwined with Emma, but I found I could not hate the being in front of me. She was a dangerous, magnetic energy that called to me. Those emotion-filled brown orbs fixed on me were a lie, but they were Emma’s eyes.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “They won’t find me.”
I nodded and looked away. “You killed Jo.”
Rising from the chair slowly, it was as if she were being careful not to spook me. She couldn’t know that I was too tired to run. The anguish had seeped into the marrow of my bones, infecting my will. If I reached for my magic, I knew it wouldn’t be there for me grasp. I had nothing to hope for.
“Jo tried to kill me first,” she said. “We couldn’t have that.”
We.Another casual admission that we weren’t alone struck me harder than I thought it would. Perhaps some part of me thought if she were unaware of her condition, that maybe there were moments she was only herself. But Emma hadn’t been alone, whether she realized it or not. Not for a long time.
“You couldn’t? Or they couldn’t,” I said, nodding in her direction. The ancient evil ones puffed up and out around her, haunting her.
She waved a hand as if dismissing a child and they disappeared, drawn back into her like a bat’s wings. “I didn’t want to kill Jo,” she said, licking her lips in a motion that was far too Emma-like.
“No, you want the whole world to burn,” I said, my voice coming out just above a whisper.
Emma took a step toward me. When I didn’t move, she took several more until she was standing in front of me. I held my breath so I wouldn’t breathe in her scent.
“Remember when we were running from the soul eater?” she asked. “When we pulled over to sleep in the car because I was too tired to drive anymore, do you remember that?” Running her delicate fingers through my hair, her face was drawn in concentration.
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. Not wanting her to stop touching me and ashamed of my weakness. I remembered. It was a time where I had been the closest yet the farthest away to anyone. I believed I was damned, and I could never touch her. I believed myself unworthy.
“You told me you never lied. That you were taught lying would separate you from the light. You are the most open, guileless person I’d ever met. You had to explain to me that you were a Chevalier. A servant. You didn’t belong to anyone or anyone to you. You said,I belong to the gods until they deem I am done with the mission.”
Both of her hands slid up to cup my face, and I finally had to take a breath, the vanilla and cinnamon filling and wrapping around me. Was I breaking here in her hands?
“I understand now,” she said, her soft lips touching mine for the briefest moment. “I didn’t then, but I understand now. I am a servant, and I cannot stop until the mission is over, my love.”
I shut my eyes against the torrent of emotion ripping up my insides. Focusing on the bandage over my healing stab wound, I gripped her wrists with a bruising force, yet I did not tear them off me. I kept them on me. “I’m going to have to kill you, Emma.”
There was nothing I could do to break her free from her prison. She’d shown me that.
She rested her forehead against mine, her warm breath puffing over my lips. “You don’t have to. You can come with me. You can help me.”
Again, my throat was full of cotton, preventing me from speaking. All I could do was shake my head.
“You and I can oversee the new world as the Stygian joins with ours. Hand in hand, we would be safe.”
There was a twinge of desperation in her voice that forced me to open my eyes. Naked want shone out from her face. “I need you, Calan. Even now.”
I noticed she was using “I” again and I didn’t know if she was speaking as Emma or if it was the beast pretending to be her.
Emma closed her eyes. “What happened on our wedding night. I could have killed you, but I didn’t. Even though I serve the dark gods now, I still could never hurt you.”
Searching her face, looking for the ancient evil inside her, I saw nothing but the truth. If she had wanted to kill me, she could have done it then. The darkness inside her could compel her to kill me now, and I probably couldn’t stop her. But she didn’t. Emma’s love for me had survived whatever transformation she had undergone. I was safe with her and despite my threat, she was safe with me, for the time being.
