BALLERINA
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Saya Claymore
Maybe it was never a nightmare. The fear of dancing in front of nightwalkers, the red in their eyes, hands clapping in unison.
What if it was a dream?
What if it was something I wanted?
I slip my foot into the pointe shoes after cracking, twisting and whacking them against the sprung wood. With every bang, Serun’s ears bend back, and he tweaks an eye, but he doesn’t ask what I am doing.
After some adjustments, my feet fit snugly. With one leg crossed over the other, I wrap and tie the ribbon around each ankle, the movements automatic. Comforting.
A perfect fit.
I rise and tap each toe box against the wood before briefly going up en pointe to check for pain. I’m a little stiff, but it’s bearable.
I face Serun, and with a shaky breath out, I nod. It’s stupid of me to dance without stretching. It has been years since I’ve done this. Still, the idea of delaying this excitement causes my heart to stir.
Serun rests his chin against the harp and holds his hands in position. Anxiety grips my stomach, churning when the music, ethereal and slow, flows through the room.
Crap, I don’t know where to start. I stand there, legs locked, while the music calls me to begin.
I close my eyes, hoping a memory rises to the surface, when a bite of cold touches my hand. My eyes fly open to Serun standing before me. The harp plays on without him, shadowed fingers flowing across strings while he is here with me. “Perhaps we can dance together.”
“You can dance?”
He takes my hand, lifting it and leaning down as if to kiss my knuckles, but instead touches his forehead to it with a bow. “I’ve been around long enough to learn.”
I breathe a laugh and step towards him, our bodies pressing against each other and eyes locked. “One day, you’re going to tell me how old you are, nightwalker.”
“One day.”
We dance slowly, my feet following his. My body knows more than my mind, feeling not thinking as we spin in a circle. Serun’s other hand grabs my hip, pulling me closer and picking up the pace.
My breath sharpens, but I keep up, my movements becoming more vital, feeling as if our dance was made before the goddess herself.
Silver hair spins as Serun twirls me around like a ballerina in a music box. The harp grows louder in my ears, suffocating me in tranquil music, and the room blurs before we stop, my back snapping against Serun’s chest.
His hand moves to my hip, and my body instinctively knows what to do as he lifts me. I stretch into a modified arabesque, my right arm in first position, while my left rests in second, draped back over Serun while he wraps me in a lover’s embrace, twirling in our pas de deux.
The music heightens, Serun’s body against mine and the control in his hands as he moves me, the world and trauma-filled memories blurring. I close my eyes and tip my head back, longing to stay in this feeling I’ve so missed, only for the music to abruptly end.
Serun quickly lowers me to the ground, and I stumble a step. Worry pinches his brows as he digs into his pocket and takes out his phone to answer a call, and my heart lurches.
“What’s wrong? Is it Cole?”
Serun mutters something in Daryun, including what sounded like a swear, before slipping the phone back into his pocket. “Not Cole—at least I don’t think so. My brother. I sensed something in my bond with him. Now I cannot reach him by mind or phone.”
Bond? A memory surfaces of Serun seeming to answer my thoughts when I was on my deathbed. I wonder…
With a shake of my head, I say, “What do we do now?”
“Olivia and Maeve will watch over you while I track—”
I step closer and grab his arm. “I’m coming with you.”
“Saya…”
“I won’t take no for an answer.” I sit down on the studio floor and untie a ribbon before I kick off the first ballet slipper and start working on the other. “If you go, so do I. You made me your consort. Deal with my demands.”
He sighs and crouches in front of me. His clawed finger hooks around an abandoned slipper, and through the darkness, there’s softness in his tone when he says, “Forgive me for cutting your distraction short. I had hoped you would have more time here to understand the Undercity. More time in safety.”
His words are sweet. Honey on the tongue. But I can’t think like that now. Cole needs me.
“I’m going to undress,” I say, and Serun’s eyes widen when I start to do just that. He grunts, and in a flash turns away from me. His shadows expand, creating a wall between us. I smile, though it sours a moment later. Enough for the strings bound to my heart to pull tighter.
The tights and leotard drop to my feet. “I’m going to try to convince Cole to stay here, and if he says yes, we can return to this moment.
By then, it won’t be a distraction. It would finally be living—and accepting the part of me I was taught to hate.
Since being here, I haven’t had to worry about my appearance. ”
“Because you are surrounded by those who look like you.”
“Aside from the hair…and skin.”
“Those are abnormalities I enjoy looking at.”
I smooth out my clothes. “You can look now.”
Shadows fall, and Serun turns. “You should rest. I will get Penumbra to pack your belongings. And Olivia’s…”
“Olivia is coming?”
Shadows roll around his knuckles. “Yes. If I need to hunt, I want you protected. Maeve would have been optimal, or even Lucifer. But both have agreed to work together to manage the Undercity while we do this.”
My eyes narrow. “How did you speak to them? Were they on the end of that phone call?”
Serun looks away, as though reluctant to share. “We can talk through our minds. I’m having two conversations right now. One is with you, and the other is with them.”
“Fascinating…The first time I spoke to Reyes on the phone, there were brief moments of stillness, and your lip curled as if you heard something irritating.”
“He is quite the annoyance…”
“Can you hear my mind?”
Silence. There’s my answer.
“Explains a lot,” I murmur. “Sometimes you smile like you know something, and I guess you do—because you have been listening to my thoughts. It’s a little disturbing.”
Serun reaches out to me, and I hesitate, jerking back and out of his reach.
“I don’t mean to,” he says, eyes imploring.
“I’m not doing it on purpose. After we shared blood, we formed a connection.
Most times, I ignore your words. Let it flit past. But when you think something outlandish, I find it difficult not to react.
I would never use your thoughts against you, or to gain something from you.
I want you wholly, not through manipulation. ”
“Then, if that is the case, why can’t I hear you?”
“I don’t know…This is unheard of with nightwalkers.”
“You are mine for this lifetime, Saya Claymore,” my Blessed whispers in my ear.
“I shall kill him. Torture would be preferable, but if he is obstructing you being mine, I will do it in a heartbeat.”
Sighing, I close the gap between us and rest my finger against his lips. “Don’t respond to my thoughts, please. I understand you can’t help hearing them, but I’d rather not engage unless I decide to talk about it, okay?”
He inclines his head in agreement.
I move to pull away, but he grabs my wrist, leans in, and kisses my knuckles. Intense red eyes pin me as he says, “I’m sorry for withholding this information from you. If you consider this a liar’s tongue transgression, I will understand your hesitation.”
As he lowers my hand and straightens, I cup his cheek. “We’ll call it even when I can do it too.”
He smiles.
I look to the doors, my mind flitting beyond the manor and back to Maeve’s cottage. “Recently, your family was prepared to go against you if you left the Undercity. Why the change of heart?”
“Since getting to know you, they have grown to understand your importance to our family. They are curious to learn more about your past, and the only way to do that is to…”
“Take me back to Cherry Bloom.”
“They want Reyes and Avianna to return with Cole, while I go with you to Cherry Bloom.” His eyes narrow. “I know you want to keep your brother close, but he could still be injured and in need of healing. It would be best for him to recover in the Undercity while I take you home.”
My hands ball into fists, harsh words eager to bite their way out of my mouth, but he’s right. I can’t go to Cherry Bloom with an injured Cole—especially if the slayers will be after us.
The best place for him is to be surrounded by nightwalkers.
“Okay,” I breathe, that word slipping past the hundreds filled with refusal. “We will bring him back here and get him settled, and then we will go to Cherry Bloom.”
With that, we make our way out of the studio. As Penumbra closes the doors behind us, I catch one last glimpse of a life I desperately want to grasp.
There will be time for dreams later.