Текст книги "The Singer"

Автор книги: Elizabeth Hunter

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Текущая страница: 17 (всего у книги 20 страниц)

She crossed her arms over her chest, and he could feel her withdrawing. “How could you not remember?”

“It’s not like I had a choice, Ava!”

“But…” She worked to speak. “It was… our time together, Malachi. It was—”

“Brief. I know. They told me it was only a few months. But we are bound. Marked. So it’s possible—”

“It wasn’t brief,” she said softly. “It was everything.”

He stopped speaking, and the anger drained away.

“It was everything,” she repeated. “The happiest time of my life. The first time I felt like I belonged anywhere. With anyone. With you.”

He reached for her, glad she didn’t pull away. He’d known he loved her, but until that moment, he’d had no concept of how much she had loved him. It thrilled him. Malachi wanted to roar in triumph, but Ava was still trembling.

“I’m remembering more every day. I do remember some things, and—”

“Do you remember any of the things I just mentioned?”

He paused. Malachi ached that those moments were a blank in his mind. “No, Ava, but—”

“So you don’t. This isn’t just about me.” She shook her head stubbornly. “And if you don’t remember me—”

“Are you serious?” He was angry again. “I don’t remember you?”

“You just said—”

“Ava, you are the only thing I remember!”

She said nothing, but he could see the doubt in her eyes.

“When I woke… there was nothing,” he whispered. “Nothing. I was nothing until you called me. I heard nothing until I heard your voice. I didn’t remember my name until you named me. I do remember a few things. It’s coming back. And each memory is like a beacon—a marker—of the life I lost. You were the first one. I will remember more. And we will make new memories together. So many that the life I lost will be nothing to compare to it.”

The doubt still lived in her eyes. He wanted to battle her doubt and fear the way he battled a physical enemy, but he couldn’t.

“Please, Ava. You have to understand.”

“I love you.” She spoke so softly he almost didn’t hear her. “I never stopped. Even when you died. But do you love me?”

He knew it without question.

“Yes.”

“But how—”

“I love…” He stepped closer to her and spoke firmly. “I love you.”

How could he make her understand when he hardly understood himself?

“I don’t remember the first time I kissed you,” he said. “I don’t remember the first time we made love. And Ava… I may never remember those things. But I know I love you the same way I know that… I’m right-handed.” He tried to smile, but he knew it came out forced. “I love the taste of oranges because they make me think of my mother… who I also don’t really remember. The same way I know that… I will have to shave twice a day for the rest of my life or resign myself to a full beard. I don’t like guns, but knives are like an extension of my own hand and axes are highly underrated.”

“Malachi—”

He just kept going. “I like beer and not vodka. I get restless when I’m too long indoors and want—need to go running.”

He saw her eyes start to soften, so he stepped closer and prayed she didn’t retreat from him.

“I don’t remember a fraction of what I was taught in my training, who is on the council in Vienna, or what singer is popular on the radio. But I can tell you what foods I like and what music makes me want to tear my hair out. And I can tell you, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I love you.”

She lifted a hand and clenched it above her heart. “Please—”

“Because loving you is part of who I am. It’s not a memory or a moment. It is in my soul. And I will never—can never—forget my soul.”

Ava said nothing. His heart raced. But finally she went to him, embraced him, and Malachi let out a relieved breath. He wrapped his arms around her and pressed his cheek to her temple.

“I don’t understand it either. I just know it’s true.”

“I love you,” she said. “And part of me thinks it’s not fair of me to love you when you don’t remember—”

“Don’t say that. Don’t ever say that.”

“I don’t care!” Her voice was fierce, and he reveled in it. Reveled in her possession. The way her arms tightened around him, claiming his body as her own. “I lost you once. And I pulled you down from heaven to bring you back. You’re mine.”

“Completely.” He kissed her temple. Her cheekbone. “Completely, Ava.”

Working his way down her face, he searched for Ava’s lips.

“Some days—”

He found them. Kissed her silent, but she pulled away to say, “Some days I thought I wouldn’t breathe again. That I didn’t even want to.”

“I need you.” He was rock hard and aching for her. Like her kiss, her body was heat and substance. Not the thin shadow of a dream, but flesh and blood and skin and life.

She began to pull at his shirt. He stepped back and tugged it over his head. Her hands spread out over his chest and dug in, her fingers gripping him almost painfully. Malachi threw his head back and groaned.

“Ava.”

She kissed his chest, licked at his skin, tugged at the hair that grew there and scraped her teeth over a sharply aroused nipple. His hands pushed her shirt up her waist to feel the heat at the small of her back as she painstakingly undressed him. The button on his pants, then the zipper. Then she slipped her fingers down the back and pushed down, taking all his clothes with him. He was helpless under her small hands.

Walking him back to the bed in the corner, she waited until his knees hit the edge, then she came down with him, stripping him of his socks, running her hands up his legs. Her mouth followed everywhere.

“You’re real,” she whispered, over and over again. “Real.”

“Come here.”

“Your face…” She stood and traced a finger over the arc of his cheekbones. The curve of his lips. “Real.” Her warm palm opened on his skin. “Your shoulders…”

Bare. His body hummed with energy, and he tried to ignore the burn of shame at the reminder of his bare skin. He was naked before her in every way.

“Your hands.” Her voice was thick with emotion. He could hear the tears she battled as she reached down and linked their hands together.

“Ava, please. I need you.”

She ignored him, kneeling on the ground between his legs. “Your feet…” Her nails scraped up the sensitive flesh of his ankles. “Real.” Her fingers followed up his calves to his knees. She bit the skin on his inner knee as her fingers tickled the sensitive flesh behind. “Legs. Real. Knees. Real.” Her tongue traced a line up the inside of his thigh.

She brought him back to life only to kill him slowly. Malachi couldn’t tear his eyes away from her lips. She bent down and kissed the very real arousal that was staring her in the face.

“I need you too,” she whispered.

The heat of her mouth enveloped him. She took him deep, and he twisted his hands in her dark hair.

“Ava,” he groaned again, his head falling back and his eyes closing in ecstasy. He wanted to keep watching, but… “I can’t.”

Her mouth left him. “But—”

“Not that.” He would spend himself like a virgin if she kept going, and he needed to be in her, connected more deeply than just her mouth. “Come here.”

He pulled her up and grabbed her waist, tossing her on the bed as he began to undress her.

“Too many.” The shoes and heavy socks were gone. “Clothes.” The pants, history. “In Norway.” The delicate lace-edged panties could be replaced, along with the stockings.

Half undressed, she arched back and fumbled to remove her sweater, long-sleeved shirt, and bra. Malachi took the opportunity to bend down and taste her as she had tasted him.

“Malachi,” she moaned, halting her movements to enjoy his tongue. “I thought…”

“I missed your taste,” he murmured, pausing to lightly bite the inside of her thigh. “The scent of you. Dreams were not enough.”

“Real,” she whispered again. “Not a dream.”

He spread her legs wider, kneeling down on the floor to take the edge off his hunger. Beautiful. She was utterly beautiful in her pleasure. Her legs thrown over his shoulders. His arms holding her down. He felt her shirt hit him in the face.

“Come up here,” she whispered. “Kiss me.”

He kneeled on the bed, bracing himself over her, feeling the heat from her body. Their breaths mingled together when their lips met, and he pulled her leg up as he slid inside, seating himself to the hilt. He thrust his hips when he felt her clench around him.

Real.

Now he understood why she said it, over and over again. Everything paused in that moment, as he looked in her eyes.

Real.

“I love you,” he whispered.

Ava smiled, and there were tears in her eyes. “I believe you.”

“I love you, reshon.”

“I love you, too.” She held on to him as he began to move. “So much it hurts.”

“Don’t hurt. Please, Ava. Not anymore.”

She was always the one who wanted faster, but this time, she didn’t have to beg.

“Too long.” He was going to come apart in her arms. Fly to pieces when her legs wrapped around him and her heels dug into the back of his thighs. “Ava!”

“Yes,” she breathed. “There you are.”

“I’m here.” He was very, very there.

“Not a dream.”

He reached down, changed the angle of his thrusts until she let out a hitched breath that told him—how did he know?—she was close.

“Yes,” she chanted again. “Yes yes yes…”

He felt her go over the edge and he followed, moving through the rush of her climax and closing his eyes as the lights flashed in his mind. He saw them before, making love in a cave, thousands of miles away, her mouth falling open in pleasure and her head thrown back. The images overlapped in his mind, and he saw them.

The first time.

Again.

Always.

His body met his soul, and Malachi lived.

Chapter Twenty-two

The forest was warmer, but darkness still hovered around the edges. The hedge was wide and high, and though she could hear him on the other side, she did not try to find her way to him. She sat in the center of the dark meadow, knees drawn up to her chest, listening as he paced.

“Why do you keep him away when you brought him back?”

She turned her head and the radiant creature was with her again. “Did I?”

He sat down on the grass next to her and stretched his legs out. “Bring him back? Yes. It was unexpected.”

“How?”

The Fallen glanced up. “I am no longer privy to the whims of heaven. Nor do I fully understand your power.”

“I’m not really sure I have that much power to begin with.”

“If I did not feel your uncertainty, I would think you were jesting.” He grimaced. “Your soul rears in rebellion, even in this place.”

“Rebellion against what?”

He ignored her and turned his face back to the sound of pacing outside the hedge. “Tell me. Why do you keep him away?”

Her heart stuttered. “I… don’t know him.”

“Yes, you do.”

“I could hurt him.”

“Yes, you could.”

She could feel the frown creasing her forehead. “I don’t understand this place. Is it a dream? I thought it was a dream. It didn’t seem real, but now I think it was. It is.”

The Fallen sneered. “Foolish child. Dreams are more real than you know. It has always been so. What is the world around us but a dream?”

“What do you mean?”

He shifted quickly, and she saw before her a nondescript human in glasses, then a giant black cat, then a pure gleam of light. Or had she? Before she could blink, the shining creature was sitting next to her again.

“What do you think I mean?”

“Are you real?”

“Very real.”

Their eyes met, and she felt a thread of connection that surprised her. “Who are you?”

“You know who I am. You will wake this time and remember it.” He lifted an eyebrow. “Unless your human mind rebels against that, too.”

“Rebellion,” she murmured, remembering what he had said before. “What am I rebelling against?”

“Who you are. Who he is.” He nodded toward the sound of the pacing man beyond the dark hedge, then the creature leaned forward and dropped his head to hers. “You will always rebel,” he whispered in her ear. “Against power. Against control. Against the will of others. It is in your very blood, Ava. I may have fallen, but you ripped the threads of heaven itself to get what you wanted.”

“I didn’t mean to.”

“It doesn’t matter.” His voice vibrated with a peculiar resonance. It was excitement and dread. Curiosity and pride, all at once. “Or maybe that is all that matters.”

Her heart began to race. The angel pulled back and narrowed his eyes at the sound of the pacing man beyond the hedge.

“He does not understand yet,” the creature murmured. “Not yet. But soon.”

“Was it bad? To call him back?” Panic was a fist around her heart.

“You don’t ask the right questions, child.”

“What do you—”

“What is bad, what is good? These things are unimportant. You must only ask, is it necessary?”

He was necessary. Not the angel. The man beyond the dark hedge was necessary. She could feel it in her bones, though her head ached with confusion as she listened to him pace.

She wanted him, but he frightened her.

“Are you frightened of him or for him?” her companion wondered. “I don’t know. I know so many things about you. Where you sleep. When you dream. But I cannot interpret the emotions I feel.”

“Can you ever?” she asked. “With humans?”

“I don’t know that I ever tried.” He shrugged. “Maybe. Or perhaps I simply do not remember. I have existed longer than your mind can fathom.”

The man beyond the hedge continued to circle, growing ever more agitated. She could sense his desire to come to her. His desire to protect her from the creature that sat at her side. She knew this, just as she knew that she could not let him in.

“Not yet,” she whispered.

The Fallen smiled. “No, not yet.”

“What do you want from me?”

He placed a hand on her temple and whispered, “It’s time to listen.”

But it wasn’t a song she fell into. The images shot to her mind in glittering, violent life. Two dark eagles with golden eyes, wings spread as they screamed. They flew at each other, colliding in midair as blood dripped over her eyes. A wolf paced at her feet and a tiger lounged in the distance, watching with a lazy, glowing stare.

Only watching.

Jackals circled and laughed, but the laughter held fear, not glee. All the while, the great birds screamed as feathers and blood filled the air.

They tore at each other until one, claws dripping with blood, plunged his bladed beak into the chest of the other, ripping its heart until the great bird fell at her feet, staring into her eyes as she screamed.

“I will tear the threads of heaven to return. And you will help me, Ava.”

Tears were hot on her face when she woke. Ava gasped and sat up, but Malachi did not stir beside her. His bare shoulders twitched as if he was still dreaming. She looked at him, scooting away until they no longer touched. She had slept pressed against him, and her body revolted at the loss.

But her mind…

Somewhere in his sleep, he reached for her. He stretched his arm across the expanse of the bed until his hand lay resting against the skin of her ankle. His fingers closed around it, he took a deep breath, then he relaxed into sleep again.

“Why do you keep him away?”

She remembered everything from her dream. Unlike the misty visions she’d clung to when she’d dreamt of Malachi, her vision of Jaron was glaringly clear.

“You will always rebel… It is in your very blood.”

The thought made her shiver, so she stared at the broad expanse of Malachi’s back, mentally tracing the patterns that were no longer there.

In the silent darkness, a wave of doubt washed over her.

What had she done? It was Malachi, but it wasn’t. She had made love to a dream but woken with a man she no longer knew. A stranger who claimed to love her but had no memories of their brief life together.

“Imagine a person created for you. Another being so in tune with you that their voice is the clearest you’ve ever heard in your mind.”

Would she still hear him as she had? Or had their connection been permanently severed in death?

Had she heard his voice the night before? Had she imagined it? Maybe she’d forced herself not to listen for it, but a tiny voice whispered to her that maybe…

Maybe Malachi wasn’t truly hers. Not anymore.

“I think I’d pull down heaven if that’s what it took to keep you here with me.”

“And I’d abandon it if you weren’t there.”

The memory of his words brought tears to her eyes, because as precious as that memory was to her, he wouldn’t remember it. He wouldn’t remember their first kiss or the soft laughter after they’d made love. He wouldn’t remember her anger and confusion or his quiet way of reassuring her with just a look and a hand. He wouldn’t remember the stories she’d told him about her family or the rambling memories of four hundred years of life that he’d shared with her.

Mind-boggling. Wonderful.

Gone.

He wouldn’t remember the night he mated her, drawing his magic onto her body or the passion that had united them as one. The stranger who’d come back to her had found the other half of himself, but Ava’s soul still felt torn in two.

Her hand reached out, tracing the curve of a bare shoulder. She tried to remember exactly what had once covered it, but she couldn’t. At her touch, his twitching body stilled, and she cautiously opened up her mind to his voice.

It was the same, but different. And just like before, it was startling in its clarity. Words tumbled over each other as he dreamed. She could hardly keep up with his mind. But one phrase whispered to her, over and over.

Vashama canem, reshon.

Come back to me.

This time, he was reaching for her. The dark hedge in her dream flashed into her memory, and Ava started to sniff. Malachi woke at the sound and immediately sat up, wrapping his arms around her.

“What is it?”

She shook her head but could say nothing. She’d never felt more confused in her life.

“Ava, please.” His voice was strained, and he rocked her back and forth. “I need to know how to help you. What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know what is wrong?”

“I don’t know… anything. You’re here, but I still feel alone.”

He went completely still.

She forced the words out of her mouth. “I’m so confused, Malachi. You were dead. I felt you die. I still feel that ache. But you’re here. And I was—I am so happy. I don’t know how to explain it.”

His arms dropped from around her, and he leaned away. His voice came to her so low she could barely hear it.

“I am no longer the man you love.”

She grabbed his hand, willing him to understand, even when she didn’t. “But you are. And… you aren’t.”

He rolled his shoulders. “I am not as strong as I was. My talesm—”

“Have nothing to do with how I feel about you,” she said quickly. “They never did. I didn’t fall in love with you because you were strong or fast or a good fighter.”

She couldn’t see his eyes in the low light of the early evening that filtered into the room. There was a lamp in the corner, but his back was to it.

“Why did you fall in love with me?”

She melted at the vulnerability in his voice, so different than the reckless confidence he’d always worn before.

“I fell in love with your mind, which understood me. Your humor. The way… you would look so stern, then just the corner of your mouth would turn up when you smiled.”

His face was still in shadow, but she thought she saw a smile tilt the corner of his lips, so she continued.

“I love the way you would take care of me. Of anyone you cared about. You were—are—one of the most thoughtful men I’ve ever met. And I loved how confident you were, because it gave me confidence. I thought you could protect me from anything.”

“But I didn’t.”

“You did. There were dozens of Grigori in that cistern, but I’m alive. You protected me. Even though it cost your life.” She could feel some of the tension leave his shoulders. “I’m just confused.”

“Are you sorry we made love?”

“No,” she whispered. “When I touch you, it’s like being home.”

“I feel the same way.”

She blinked hard to force back the tears. “But you don’t remember me. Or why you fell in love with me.”

“But I do love you,” he said urgently. “I don’t understand either, but when you’re in pain—as you are right now—I ache with it. I felt incomplete until I found you. Half-alive. Now you’re telling me you still feel that way, and I don’t know how to fix it.”

She couldn’t stop the tears that fell. She could hear the panicked sound of his inner voice, but she closed her eyes and whispered the spell to quiet him.

“Ava—”

“I need time, Malachi.”

“Don’t push me away.” His voice was low. Pained. “Please.”

“I won’t.” She admitted it to herself, “I can’t.”

As much confusion as she felt, she knew she needed him. She wanted the comfort of his body desperately, wanted the soothing sound of his voice. She wanted more than memories.

“This is going to take time.” She tugged him closer and leaned against his shoulder. Whatever her mind was telling her, Ava’s body shouted loud and clear that her mate was home. Wounded, but alive.

Her soul recognized him. Her body did, too. Her mind and heart would just have to catch up.

“A wound doesn’t heal,” she whispered, “just because it stops bleeding.”

“But it does heal.” He put a finger under her chin and tilted it up, so she looked into his familiar grey eyes. Pure calm. Pure determination. It settled her in a way she couldn’t put into words. It was as if her soul took a breath after holding it for too long.

“It will heal.”

They sat on the bed together, wrapped in blankets, enjoying the silence of the apartment. Ava had no idea where the others had gone. If she had to guess, they’d taken off right about the time things got interesting. And loud.

The clock on the small desk read 01:11. Midnight had crept by and dawn was far off, but Ava was wide awake. Sleeping next to Malachi had settled her energy and she’d rested better than she had in months.

The sex probably helped, too.

Her mind was clear, and her magic ran like a fluid line down her back. She could feel the mating marks he’d given her as if they were a living thing. She’d had so little time to get used to them after he’d marked her, and then he’d been gone and their power had dulled, though not disappeared, in his absence.

In his presence, she could sense them again, like a living coat of magic.

She felt his palm at her neck.

“They’re glowing,” he murmured. “Your marks.”

“Do you remember giving them to me? At all?”

“No.” He hesitated. “It’s very hard to explain. With some things, once people tell me something that has happened, then it pops into my mind, like a puzzle piece fitting, and it’s as if that memory was never gone. Other times…”

“What?”

He shook his head. “There are blanks that refuse to be filled. Maxim tried to explain to me what happened in the cistern, but none of it seemed familiar. The only flashes I have seen so far have been of you. I can… hear you, sometimes. Hear you scream. Smell the water. But other than that—”

“Maybe it’s better you don’t remember.”

“I could find the scribe house in Cappadocia, but I had no memory of Evren, Max, or Leo. Only a little of Rhys. I had a single memory of us there. The rest came in pieces. Many of which I still don’t have.”

She rubbed his arm soothingly, tracing the new spells he’d written there, which were also glowing softly as he touched her. “And these?”

“I had nothing when I first woke. I’ve scribed these only in the last month or so.”

“They’re different.”

“How?”

Ava smiled. “They’re neater, for one thing. You did the first set when you were what? Twelve? Thirteen?”

“I would have started when I was thirteen.”

She nodded. “So they were messy. But… it was kind of endearing.”

He smiled back. “How?”

“You were this big badass, right? You always were. But then you had this kind of childish writing on your left wrist and forearm. Almost like a kid drawing on himself.” Her finger ran up his arm, over the sensitive notch of his elbow and the delicate skin there. His powerful body shivered under the touch.

“Ava—”

“There were certain letters I could tell you’d exaggerated. Made more elaborate, like a young man would show off.” Her finger trailed up the curve of his bicep and over his shoulder. “Then, as you grew up, you could tell you’d matured. The letters became neater. More economical. No boyish flourishes, just… utilitarian, I guess.”

“Did you like them?” he asked, his voice hoarse.

She laid her lips on the swell of his shoulder, where a particularly beautiful talesm had once lived. Now the area was bare, but the flesh pulsed with life.

He was a miracle. A gift. But not a gift without cost.

“Your talesm were beautiful and frightening. They were you.”

She closed her eyes and her tongue flicked out, tasting his skin. A noise left his throat, and he closed his eyes, letting his head hang down as his skin shivered under her touch.

“I could stay here for days, Ava. Talking to you. Touching you,” he said. “Making love to you and learning you again. But I don’t think we should.”

The thought was tempting, but she reluctantly agreed, so she pulled her mouth away from the salt of his shoulder and shifted away. “I know. We should get back to the Oslo house.”

“I don’t like the coincidence of Sari’s haven being compromised right when there is an influx of Grigori into the nearest major city.”

“You don’t think it’s a coincidence at all, do you?”

“No.”

She sighed. “I’d like to stop running. Just for a little bit. Think that’ll ever happen again?” She scooted forward, but he grabbed her hand before she could leave the bed.

“We went to the ocean once, didn’t we?”

She smiled. Nodded. “Do you remember?”

“I remember you, standing near the waves. It was dark, and someone had lit lanterns that flew into the sky.”

She nodded, and her heart swelled. “Yes. That happened in Kuşadası.”

“See?” He kissed the palm of her hand before he smiled. “It is coming back to me even more now. Soon I will remember every moment.”

She tried to lighten the mood so she wouldn’t cry. “When you get to the part about remembering you need to put your towels in the laundry basket, focus really hard on that one, okay?”

“What?” He frowned, but she could see a familiar gleam of mischief in his eyes. “I have a habit of not putting dirty towels in the laundry? This is… shocking.”

“I’m guessing that bit hasn’t changed at all, has it?”

He grinned, and in that moment, he was the cocky warrior she hadn’t been able to keep away from so many months ago.

“Real,” she murmured.

Ava bent down to lay a searing kiss on his lips before he could stand. He held her head, fisted a hand in her hair to hold her close, before he finally let her catch a breath.

“Real,” he breathed out. “And yours. Everything else, we will work through. Together.”

“Okay,” she whispered, closing her eyes and nodding slightly, though he still clutched her hair in his hand. “Okay.”

It was more than a wish or a hope. It was a commitment. He’d been taken from her, but he was given back. A gift and a miracle. She didn’t know why or how, but he was alive.

There would be fights. Misunderstandings. But those were inevitable, weren’t they? Her heart knew him. Her soul did, too. They would learn each other again. And in the meantime, there would be no secrets.

“Malachi, in my dreams, when you’re not there… There’s someone—”

“Who?”

“Jaron.” The hand in her hair tightened, and he held her even closer. “He’s been there, Malachi. In my head. And he’s shown me things.”

He said nothing for a while, but he relaxed his hands and stroked the hair back from her face, soothing her. Touching her. As if to reassure himself that she was still there and unharmed.

“Tell me everything.”