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Then again, maybe that had been less about his gift and her reaction to it… and more that he had known they were parting. Forever. ’Cuz even if they were in the same room after that evening? He was still going to be farther than the outer bounds of the heavens from her.
And yup, in the aftermath of the demon’s treatment, he’d traded places with Tohr. Now he was the one out in the woods alone, mourning a female he’d bonded with because he couldn’t have her. The fact that his female was still alive didn’t mean anything.
There was no way he could be with her now. For one, he needed to protect Rahvyn from the demon. The farther he stayed away from her, the better, so he didn’t make a target out of his female. For another… he was not who he had once been.
Lassiter glanced down at his corporeal form and wondered how something that didn’t really exist could affect him so much. This image of a body, which he chose to inhabit when it suited his purposes, was not him. He was an entity, rather than anything mortal. Yet what had been done to him lingered, the violence and the contamination transmitted through that which was an illusion into that which was real.
All he wanted was to return to the great ether, just disappear into a flush of energy that had no consciousness whatsoever. And the only reason he hadn’t followed through on the immolation?
He thought of the Black Dagger Brotherhood, the King… their families and doggen. The civilians. The Chosen who had been liberated.
His Rahvyn.
For the species’ benefit, he needed to rally. He needed to get in gear. He needed to pull up his bootstraps, get motivated, get back into the game, address the ball, find his stance, assume the position.
The pep talk didn’t work. It hadn’t worked.
He was beginning to worry it wasn’t going to.
Crossing his arms over his chest, his eyes refocused on the sliver of glow at the horizon. There was almost none of the sunset’s illumination left, and he found the parallel apt. There was not much of him left, either.
On that note, he looked down at the satchel he’d brought out with him. Opening the neck, he poured some of the contents into his palm. The tangle of golden links glowed, even in the gathering darkness, and he moved the weight around. He’d worn the necklaces, bracelets, and earrings for years because there was something of the sun in gold, and when he hadn’t been able to get outside to bathe in the solar stuff directly, he’d liked to have the warmth against his skin. Plus, given that his wedding jesses had been stolen some time ago, maybe there had been a little making up for that on his part.
More than a little.
He’d taken all his gold off before he’d turned his body over to the demon. Now? He wasn’t putting it back on. Ever. The shit would probably turn black.
Funneling the links back into the little bag and cinching the tie, he wound up a pitch and sent the satchel flying into the view’s anonymity. Just as it was silhouetted against that faint hearth of a sunset, he blew it to hell and gone with a burst of energy, the sparkling explosion like a fall of stars.
Enough, he thought. No one was coming to save him. Saviors did not get rescued.
He needed to go back to the Brotherhood, to Caldwell, to the species that he had agreed to oversee. Enough of this self-imposed purgatory—
That image of Rahvyn’s enchanting face intruded once again, sandblasting his best intentions away.
He’d only held her once. When he’d told her goodbye.
Something hit his hand, and he glanced down. The silver droplet glistened and the heat that registered was the first sensation he had felt since…
Well, since he’d come here to this mountain, at any rate.
Shaking the tear off, he pulled a swipe under his eyes and then regarded the pads of his fingers. What came out of him when he was in pain was like mercury, the reflective liquid smooth and clingy, preferring to find a stasis point that was perfectly round if it could gather enough of itself.
Turning away, he walked back to the entrance of the cave.
He had known true love when he’d seen it, when he’d scented it in his nose, when he’d felt it in his body. Then he’d done a terrible thing to himself for the right reason, and there was no going back.
Better to have loved and lost?
“Bullshit,” he muttered as he ducked his head and disappeared once more into the hideout.
CHAPTER THREE
Non-temporal Plane of Existence
Somewhere in Time and Space
Of course I like you.”
As Rahvyn lowered herself to the hot-pink grass, she crossed her legs under her seat and put her elbows on her knees. Overhead, the psychedelic sky was a brilliant orange, clouds of red and yellow drifting by, the pseudo-sun a brilliant, glowing blue. Fluffy trees of ostrich plumes and golden branches undulated in a soft breeze that smelled of lilies, and birds made of heat waves and shimmers flittered by. Off to the side, a lavender lake was still, its surface a mirror that reflected back the world that had been created as both a sanctuary… and a vault.
