12
Psi raced out of the hotel doors the moment after the elevator hit the ground floor. He looked left and right, but Viviane was already long gone. She couldn’t have gone too far on foot. Unless she’d gotten into a car.
His gaze fell on the taxi stand. He was about to ask one of the valets if he’d put a pale woman with white hair wearing an orange dress and red shoes into a car. He knew no one could forget someone like his Vivi. But he also knew she wouldn’t have climbed in a car. She would’ve gone for water.
Horror weighted his brow at the realization. She would’ve gone for water. She might already be on a ley line. She might already be in Italy now. Rome itself didn’t have any lines but there were some nearer places that did. She could be anywhere.
Psi raced over to the fountain across the street from the hotel. Those waters sprang from an underground well. Whatever waters Vivi’s body was in, this current would find her.
He closed his eyes and submerged his fingers into the water. Pushing aside all sea life, he searched for her. It took him only a moment before he found her.
She wasn’t in the ocean. She wasn’t in the Mediterranean. No, he felt her presence nearby. Near, but faint. Like she was moving through sludge.
He’d be the first to admit that many of the waters in and surrounding Greece were polluted. But none were as polluted as…
Psi jerked his hand out of the clear fountain water. His fingers trembled as the night air sought to dry the droplets of his fingertips. He knew where she was. She was in the very worst place she could possibly be.
Psi stood and surveilled his options. Driving was out of the question. Not unless he could clear the roads of every single car on the congested streets of Athens.
He could dive down into the well. But navigating the underground waterways was tricky and he hadn’t done it since they were installed. It would be too easy to lose his way.
He looked up to the sky. He didn’t have a choice. Anything else was too risky, and Vivi’s life was nothing he’d ever gamble with. So, in the blink of an eye, the clear evening clouded over and a deluge poured down onto the streets of Athens.
With water raining down, Psi rose up on the droplets. The storm carried him across town as the waters flooded the streets. Athens hadn’t seen a downpour like this since Biblical times when Psi had been an angry godling rebelling against his parents.
He skated through the streets, ignoring the car accidents and drenched residents until he came upon the sewage system. He scaled the fence in a mighty leap. On the banks, he saw one of Vivi’s shoes. It sat solitary while he caught sight of its pair sinking into the slop of the sewage.
Psi crash landed onto his knees. He was too late. He’d failed her. Nausea gripped his sore muscles. Pain struck a chord in his throat as he prepared to wail his anguish.
But then he saw it. Movement in the sludge. Pale arms were headed straight for the teeth of the sewage machines.
Psi didn’t hesitate. He dove into the rank and rancid sewage, shoving aside refuse until he had her in hand. Her foot met his palm and he tugged her to him.
But the current of the machines was powerful. It put up a fight for the prize that had slipped into this trap. But Psi was a god.
With the might of his will, he separated the water from the refuse, sending all of the oils and chemicals and plastics and paper into the teeth of the mechanical device. The waste clogged the system and washed Psi and Vivi back to the banks of the drainage system.
Psi held Vivi’s limp body to him as the skies continued to empty. He allowed the rainwater to cleanse the grime from them as he rode a wave up beyond the sewers, above the congested traffic accidents, until they got to the beach where they’d met earlier tonight.
The rain slowed as he set his precious cargo down at the water’s edge.
Psi removed the bedraggled garment from Vivi’s body.
No amount of dry cleaning, mechanical or magical, would save it.
While her eyes remained closed, he laid healing hands on her body, finding and eradicating any and every ailment that had dared mar her perfection.
Vivi’s eyes fluttered open by the time he was done. His hands were resting on her ankle as he gazed up from her toes to find her face. He still had the urge to take her toes into his mouth, dirty bastard that he was.
But he didn’t. It was not his right. To prove the point, she jerked her feet from him.
“I was nearly eaten alive,” she said.
“Never would’ve happened,” said Psi. “I told you I would never let anything harm you.”
She stared at him, disbelief in her wide, translucent eyes. “You let me go. You said you wouldn’t trap me.”
“Not against your will. I want you to want me, for me.”
Her gaze was unblinking as she narrowed her eyes. “You let me go because you wanted me to come to you of my own free will?”
“Yes.”
“Just like you flashed your teeth at me because you liked me?”
Psi nodded his head.
Vivi shook hers. “These emotions, they’re all so confusing.”
“Tell me what you want, Vivi. Ask anything of me and it’s yours.”
She searched his face for a moment. It took her a few tries before words came from her mouth. Psi was beside himself, holding his breath to make sure he didn’t miss a consonant of her request. And finally, she spoke.
“I want for you to hold me and not let me go.”
He had to run the words through his head a couple of times before he trusted they weren’t his heart’s desire speaking over her.
By the time he trusted her words were true, she was turning away from him.
And he doubted himself once more. He needed to be sure because once she got inside his embrace he would never let her go.
“Come here.” His voice was equal parts demand and plea.
She turned back to him. Her eyes were downcast as though storm clouds hung in place of her eyebrows. Psi ached to reach out to her, to shine his inner light on those clouds he knew were his fault. But he had to be sure. And so he decided to meet her halfway. He held out his hand to her.
Vivi stared at his open palm. Slowly, she placed one and then her other knee on the ground beneath her. She came to a kneeling position. Her hand reached out and was nearly in his grasp when she froze.
She looked behind herself at her bare feet. Her bright eyes widened impossibly larger. She reached out and braced herself on the ground with both her hands. Carefully, gingerly, she rose from her knees and placed her feet under her and came to standing.
“I’m standing,” she said. “I’m standing on my own two feet.”
“You’re healed.” He came to stand before her, still not touching her without her express permission.
“You?” she asked. “Did you do this?”
He nodded. Uncertainty flooded his chest. Had he overstepped his boundaries once again?
“How?” she asked.
“I’m a god.”
A small laugh escaped her perfect lips. “You healed me.”
She placed her hand in his. Psi couldn’t help himself. His fingers curled around hers and he pulled her body into his chest.
“Do I have to worship you now?” she asked.
He grinned at that. “It’s I who worships you.”
She gasped, looking at him with the pall of disbelief in her clear eyes. Psi reached up and wiped the look away with a press of his lips to her forehead.
“I love you,” he whispered into that space. “That’s what it means when a god offers his devotion.”
“I think I understand it now.” Vivi tilted her head up. The lines of disbelief evaporated and were replaced with droplets of wonder. “Why people cry when they’re happy.”
Like sea creatures and sailors alike, Psi knew that all waters ran into the sea. Yet the sea itself was never full. Psi’s lips met Vivi’s as they would do forever until the end of time. Though he kissed her now, he knew he would never have his fill of this water witch.