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"What happened to Thor?" He'd at least heard of that Norse god.
She rolled her eyes. "That camelongafter I was dead. In my day, we had a father and a trickster, but they were vague and half-formed concepts. Eventually, those concepts grew, gained names, and became a whole set of gods, but that was centuries after my death." She pushed out a breath. "Thane, I lived before we were called Vikings, which means before Valhalla, Norse gods, and most of the crap you know. My faith was a lot more functional, based on surviving the winter and growing food in the summer. Our ceremonies were simple, because we had to do them ourselves. For a wedding, all you have to do is promise to protect your wife against harm and vow that my people are now yours."
"Fitting." He leaned back. "I mean, that's kinda what we're already doing, right? You and me, trying to fix this whole religion thing, so I guess it's not really a change. We're just telling your people about it and making it official."
"Oh, it's a change." She caught his wrist and turned it, showing the mostly healed mark where she'd bit him the night he called her back. "We started as enemies, and we're about to do something completely unheard of. If this works, you have just crippled one of the Inquisition's favorite ways to catch us. You've just rendered our names useless."
"Only for the women, though," he pointed out.
She shook her head. "No, because if trans people can change their names, and we can truly adapt to modern society, then the idea of a true name will weaken. It means that everyone can do what Cain did. Thane, it's all about mind over matter, and this? I think it might actually matter."
"And that's a good thing, but you got one piece wrong." He shifted his arm until he had her hand. "You and I were never enemies. The first time I saw you, I wanted to save you. When you saw me, you wanted to throw me in a bed, not tear me apart. Even once we figured out what each other was, we weren't really enemies. You could have come at me in that abandoned building. I dropped the damned clavum, but you chose the window instead." He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles. "We'veneverbeen enemies, Dahlia. We were just on opposite sides. The two things are not the same."
A slow clap came from the space behind him. Thane nearly groaned, able to guess who it was. Sure enough, when he looked back, there was Roarke, making a production of it.
"Fancy speech. Well done." Then he leaned slightly and looked at Dahlia. "I'll stand in for his kin. Figure with a last name like Keegan, we're probably related somewhere down the line, being Irish and all."
Thane just looked at Dahlia and sighed. "Ok. Truth be told, I might be tempted to stake afewof you, but I'll be selective about it."
She ducked her head and actually giggled. "Roarke, you're in. Never wanted to kill anyone as much as my own family. Figure that's true for most people, which means you and Thane are as good as cousins."
ChapterTwelve
THANE
The strangest thing was that they actually celebrated. It was tense and a little weird, but as the eidolon began to relax, most of them got friendly. Roarke, oddly enough, helped. His caustic banter got the same back, which made the others eventually laugh. It didn't take long before they began to introduce themselves, both to him and to each other.
Everyone in the room was from both a different time and place. Thane knew their names were fake, but he didn't care. Nikki had died in Salem, but not because she was a witch. In fact, it was her testimony that had caused the entire panic, setting elitist Puritans against their rich neighbors instead of the slaves and other marginalized people. Talk about some serious revenge! Instead, she'd died later, neglected and abused in jail because she was a slave that no one wanted.
Cain was from Africa before any colonization and long before history was recorded. Vivian had been a prostitute in the Wild West. Roarke was a tradesman from Ireland in the 1700s. Laci had died in Scotland while giving birth back in the 1500s. Such very different people, so many time periods, and yet the stories went on.
One of the guys was from northern Canada, back near the time of Christopher Columbus. Another girl had lived in southern Syria during the time of the Crusades. Every great moment in the world seemed to be represented, and most locations. All races and cultures were spread evenly across their small group. Black, white, Hispanic, Indigenous, Asian, Middle Eastern, and mixed - the only thing that made them into a group was that they'd changed at the moment of their death and rose up to almost live again.
The stories they told made Thane realize that "almost" was the truth. In many ways, their memories were more vivid than their perception of reality. It was hard to tell by just looking. They saw. They felt. They did all the things that normal people did, plus a few more. Wrapping his mind around life with senses dulled to the world was nearly impossible, but the eidolon had learned to accept this as the price of being undead. The more vitality they drank, the closer they got to living, but it was never the same. It was never trulyenough,yet they all felt they were lucky. They hadn't died. Not really. Time held little meaning for them, but fear bound them together. Fear of him.
Then Roarke looked over at Cain. "So, how'd you learn the rituals for Dahlia's gods anyway? Wasn't Norway a bit of a hike from Africa back then?"
Dahlia chuckled. "And he'd been around a few thousand years by then, so he could've walked the whole way and still had centuries to spare."
"Land masses notwithstanding," Roarke teased.
Cain just waved him down. "I first met Iona - which was the name she used back then - in Alexandria. There was a library we both wanted to see. When a group tried to rob me that evening, she was not the hero I expected to give me a hand."
"And I knew that not even the southern 'barbarians' would actually eat the flesh of their enemies," Dahlia said. "So, we figured out that we had something in common, and then shared a few stories of others like us that we'd heard of."
"I'd met a few," Cain admitted. "She hadn't. So, I began teaching her. Imagine my surprise to find that this strange, pale-skinned woman was a warrior!"
"Keep in mind," Dahlia pointed out, "That was about a hundred years before Christ, and my fair skin was just beginning to be considered acceptable - barely. Before that, I was often accused of being an albino outside of my home country. Most people had darker skin than mine."
"But lighter than mine," Cain said.
Dahlia smiled at him. "Which made us instantly become friends. Finding out that you were a walking myth, however…" She chuckled. "Even back then, priests were using his story as a cautionary tale. Needless to say, I was a little bit impressed."
Cain just gave her a very tender smile. "Well, you inspired myths too." Then he pushed to his feet. "All right, everybody. Rumor has it that these two are getting married tomorrow, so how about we give them a little time alone? Anyone who would like to help with the ceremony, stop by my place. For everyone else? Go the fuck home."
And just like that, all of the eidolon obeyed. Thane was pretty sure there wasn't anything magical about it. They'd had questions, Dahlia had answered them, and now they had better things to do. Still, he sat on the floor beside Dahlia's chair as the group made its way out. Roarke made a point of stopping by to slap Thane's shoulder and offer congratulations once again, but the rest just offered vague and general goodbyes.
The strangest thing was that it was fucking normal. Amazingly normal. It was the sort of normal thing that normal people did after a normal church service on Sunday. For his entire life, Thane had been taught that these people were the minions of the Devil. They were demons, sent to corrupt souls and destroy the earth. Instead, they were actually kinda boring.
