Chapter 19
19
MEV
So much for Kael’s insistence I stay with him. He never came back.
I assumed he would return to our shelter eventually, but his bedroll was as empty now as it had been when I fell asleep last night.
Demi-immortal.
Most sane people would make that particular fact a priority, but it was the memory of Kael lowering his head to me that greeted me first when I woke up. That kiss was everything, and it seemed, nothing. By the way he reacted afterwards, it might as well have never happened. A man who looked like that, who was the son of a king, a prince, and hundreds of years old… kissing women meant nothing to him, I supposed. Especially kissing very ordinary human women.
But you’re not just human, Mev. And you’re not ordinary.
I fully opened my eyes and looked at my hands. Besides desperately needing a manicure, nothing else seemed to have changed about them. But the memory of putting out that fire told me otherwise. Everything had changed.
I had actually done that.
Another thing that hadn’t changed was a battle between staying in bed or getting up to pee. In the end, the latter won. There was no sign of Kael or Lyra. I took care of business, fished a piece of thornroot from Kael’s leather bag and chewed on it.
“You seem skeptical of something?”
Where had Lyra come from? One second, I was alone. The next, Lyra was beside me.
“This,” I admitted, taking the thornroot from my mouth. “It’s a far cry from the toothbrush I’m used to.”
“Some humans do fashion it into a contraption that seems unnecessary. If you’d prefer, in Aetheria, many use a tooth powder for the same purpose.”
Unfortunately, tooth powder wasn’t the strangest thing about Elydor. “This is fine, thanks.” I looked around camp.
“I haven’t seen him all morn.”
She said it without judgment, but Lyra was watching me carefully.
Pretending I didn’t care about Kael’s whereabouts, I moved to the fire and sat. Though the air wasn’t cool, exactly, it wasn’t warm either. Lyra handed me a piece of something that looked like a large cracker.
“Airbread,” she said. “Though I’m afraid I have no honey or cheese for it.”
I took a bite. “This is good.”
Lyra sat on the rock beside me, her movements slow and graceful. “It is easy to carry, though as I said, preferable with a bit of cheese and honey. It is eaten by all Elydorians.”
“Do they call it airbread in Gyoria?”
Lyra laughed, the delicate tinkling sound as pleasant to the ears as she was to the eyes. “No, they do not.”
I had so many questions, it was hard to pick one to start with. “What will happen now? With my abilities?”
“They will grow, each day you are here. I can teach you many things. To create, calm, or redirect storms, use air currents to enhance your speed and agility, alter air pressure to create and amplify sound, and some things, just for fun.”
With that, she looked up into the sky, so I did as well, keeping her in my peripheral vision. Lifting her hand, Lyra began to swirl it gently in a circle. At first, nothing happened. As I watched, though, a cloud above us began to shift. To anyone else looking, it would appear natural, as if the cloud had taken shape on its own. But since I knew otherwise, it was easy to spot a heart.
“Can I do that?”
“Not yet. It is more difficult,” Lyra said, lowing her arm, “to manipulate air waves over long distances. But you will, before long. Shall we get started?”
I hadn’t realized we would train so soon. “Now?”
Lyra jumped off the rock. “Every opportunity we have. Kael mentioned leaving at first light, so I do not believe we will have much time before he returns.”
A pang of jealousy, that he’d obviously spoken to Lyra after I’d gone to bed, despite the fact that she had already retired, was a reminder that, unlike that cute heart-shaped cloud, real-life feelings were not so fluffy. They were raw, sometimes unwanted, and damned irritating.
I followed Lyra who walked toward the lake, not looking around for Kael. For someone so worried about keeping tabs on me, he was literally nowhere to be seen. At least, until I spotted him. The jerk was swimming toward us which was when I noticed his clothing.
“He’s… swimming?” I asked.
“Most likely. Kael usually either runs or swims in the morning. Or when he’s angry.”
I tried not to care that Lyra knew that about him. “You guys spent a lot of time together, I guess? On the Council?”
I’d never seen an Olympic swimmer before, but imagined that was how smooth and fast they would swim. He was like a machine.
“We did,” was all she said. “Remember what we talked about yesterday. We’ll start by understanding how air interacts with water by creating ripples. There is a delicate balance between the two elements. All elements, really, but we’ll start with these.”
I tried to concentrate, but the closer Kael got to us, the more I thought about our kiss instead of Lyra’s words. Even so, creating ripples in the water was easy enough. Until he was so close that I couldn’t ignore that he’d be at the shore, and getting out, any second.
“I’m thinking now would be a good time for a break,” I said, turning away.
Lyra chuckled. Was she just going to stand there and watch him? Completely naked? Had the two of them been together?
Stop it, Mev. One, he’s your enemy. Two, you can’t be jealous of every beautiful woman in Elydor. Isolde. Lyra. The list of his conquests, after hundreds of years, was probably a mile long.
The sound of splashing water was followed by, “Humans.”
Obviously Kael directed that to me, but I didn’t deem it worthy of a response.
“She is only half human, Kael. Or maybe you’ve forgotten.”
“Trust me,” he said, as briskly as usual. “I haven’t.”
“Please let me know when you’re decent,” I said, imagining Lyra looking Kael up and down.
No one said anything. I could hear Kael getting dressed, but then… silence.
Why was I so angry? Because he’d kissed me and bolted? Because Lyra was familiar enough with him to stand there and watch him dress? I could put out a fire with wind. Manipulate air. My father was a king, for God’s sake. And I would finally get to meet him. Why did I give a shit about some high-handed guy? Who, if we were keeping score, had also kidnapped me.
“You can turn around now.”
He was standing right behind me. I didn’t move. Mostly because he made it sound like an order.
“Mev?”
“What?” I snapped.
“Are you angry?”
“No.”
His voice was so close, I could feel Kael’s breath on my ear.
“Lyra—”
“Is gone. She’s cleaning up the camp.”
My hair, which I’d combed through with my fingers, was swept to one side as Kael laid it over my shoulder. A second later, two firm hands held me in place, one on each arm. Waiting, hoping, I still jumped when his lips touched my neck like it was the most natural thing in the world. Tilting my head, to give him better access, annoyed at myself for doing so, I otherwise didn’t move. That kiss was followed by another along the sensitive part of my neck. Shivering, I anticipated the third and fourth, until his lips teased my ear.
“I should not have left you last eve.”
“Agreed,” I said, but the edge was gone from my voice. “What if someone had come for me? Or I’d tried to escape?”
“I’d have known immediately if either of those things were to occur.”
Another kiss, just below my ear.
“I almost forgot. You’re ‘one with the land’ and all that.”
His lips were gone. Kael spun me around to face him. Or more accurately, to look up at him. “And because I slept just outside the entrance.”
“You did?”
“I did.”
He lifted my chin up toward him.
“Why?”
I looked into his eyes, and Kael did the same. Neither of us spoke.
Did he feel it too? That sense of rightness with us being together? How was that even possible? He’d kidnapped me. His father had kidnapped my mother. I was half human. Half Aetherian. Both of which he hated.
Yet…
“Because it was easier than acknowledging this.”
I knew what he meant, but asked anyway, “Acknowledging what?”
His head lowered. Not caring if we had an audience, or if he was my enemy, I closed my eyes. I’d wanted to kiss him again, in every waking moment since last night. When our lips met, slightly more familiar than yesterday, they melded together perfectly. I wrapped my arms around him as Kael deepened the kiss, and I shoved away any intruding thoughts. Fear for my future, Lyra’s presence, my jealousy, Kael’s identity. Each one, I filed away, and concentrated instead on enjoying the moment.
When he groaned, I tugged him closer. Wanting more. Wanting all of him.
Dear lord, that escalated quickly.
“Acknowledging that,” he said, breaking us apart. At least he didn’t run off this time.
“It’s just a kiss,” I said, lying so boldly, for the sake of saving face, that the words nearly stuck in my throat.
It was anything but.
“Is it, princess?”
No, it wasn’t.
“You must have kissed hundreds of women like that. Maybe thousands.”
He did smile then. “You think highly of my prowess.”
“After hundreds of years…” My gaze darted from him to the camp. I didn’t see Lyra but knew she was close by. When I brought it back to him, Kael was looking at me intently.
Too intently.
“You’re jealous of Lyra.”
“I don’t get jealous.” Another lie. And just one of my many faults.
“Hmm. I suppose you weren’t jealous of Issa, either?”
Such a big jerk. “No, as a matter of fact, I wasn’t.”
Kael took my cheeks into his hands, forcing my head upwards. I had no choice but to look deep into his eyes once again. He was no longer smiling.
“Until our kiss, I’d intended to keep you by my side until I could learn how you came through the portal. You were my captive still, because my priority is to protect Gyoria and its people.”
I could hardly breathe. Somehow, I knew what he was going to say. Goosebumps covered my arms. If his father burst into camp at this moment, I could not have looked away.
“Though I’ve not been with Issa or Lyra, I have been with many women, Mevlida. It is for that reason I could not sleep, realizing I could no sooner keep you as my captive than deny that our kiss was more than just that. Never, in all the years I have been alive, have I kissed a woman and felt the very ground beneath me settle in contentment, as if it were at peace. When I saw you on the shore, I knew.”
I didn’t ask what Kael knew. The answer was there already, as if it were a missing piece of a puzzle that was now whole.
“We are meant for each other.” It was a statement of fact, as true as any I’d ever uttered.
He didn’t bat an eye. “When did it manifest?”
I said we were meant for each other, and that was Kael’s question?
“Huh?”
“Your visions of the future. When did they manifest?”
“I… I don’t know what you mean.”
As if to show me his words weren’t meant to accuse, Kael’s thumbs rubbed my chin, his hands still cupping my cheeks as if I were a precious piece of porcelain.
“I’ve been in the presence of mages and seers, of humans who called themselves psychics when on Earth, whose magic grew here in Elydor. You said we were meant to be together as if it were as much a fact as your true identity.”
I cupped my hands over his. “I’m not sure why. Honestly.”
“Think back, Mev. Since the moment you came through that portal. Has there been another instance when you felt something more strongly than just an inkling? As if you knew, deep within yourself, about something that had not yet happened?”
“Yes. When I met Lord Draven, I knew he was bad. Or at least, not to be trusted.”
He nodded, as if my explanation were the most logical thing in the world.
“You have the Sight.”
Jesus. As if having air magic wasn’t enough.
“I do?”
“Yes. You do. As did your mother. They say she was as gifted as any human who had ever come through, so I suspect you may be as well.”
We fell silent. The ramifications were enormous. Kael seemed to realize it too.
“That’s why this feels so… right?”
“I assume so. This isn’t an area of expertise for me.”
“So is it like we’re fated mates or something? That we don’t have a choice to be together?”
He chuckled. “No. You are simply sensing the future. And in the future, we must be together.”
We couldn’t be together. Tears sprang into my eyes as my cheeks tingled. “My mother. Kael, I cannot stay here. She’ll have no idea what happened to me. She’ll be worried sick. It will kill her. I can’t?—”
“Shhh.” He pulled me into his chest. “Relax. Time works differently in your realm. You could be here for years and it would be like minutes there.”
I pulled back. “Truly?”
“Truly.”
“Why didn’t you tell me that? I’ve been so worried about what Clara must be going through.”
“You didn’t ask.”
I frowned. “Seriously?”
He seemed pretty unrepentant. “We’ll figure it out. In the meantime”—he tipped my chin up again—“you’ve no need to lie to me. Nor will I lie to you. You have my word.”
“I appreciate that, but I didn’t lie about anything.”
Kael’s brows raised. “You don’t get jealous?”
Oops. “Well, not usually. Especially not like that. But Isolde and Lyra… maybe you haven’t noticed, but they are both incredibly beautiful. And you seem so close to them. And?—”
“ You are incredibly beautiful,” he said. “And if we seem close, it is because I share a history with both. As friends, and nothing more.”
I waited for him to continue, but in true Kael fashion, it seemed he’d used his morning’s allotment of words. “I cannot stay here,” I said. As right as it felt in Kael’s arms, I had a life and a mother waiting for me.
“We shall see.”
I ignored that. “So what now?”
I could sense Kael’s unease as he looked up to the sky and then toward camp. For the first time since we’d met, there was doubt in him where usually none existed.
“We take you to Aetheria, to meet your father. Lyra will train you along the way. Perhaps we can also uncover how you were able to come through the Gate.”
So he could ensure it remained closed. “And then?”
He met my eyes once again. “And then, your fate is yours.”
Earth. Job. Mother. Friends.
Elydor. Kael. Magic. Immortality.
I didn’t relish the choice.
“In the meantime, you are mine, princess. In every sense of the word.”