Chapter 37 Forgotten Promises #2
I keep my eyes closed tight as I drink the contents down, but then I’m swaying, hands gripping my arms and keeping me on my feet.
I gasp as memories come rushing back faster than I was prepared for.
I let them all in. Memories of Kairos and I training our soldiers and laughing as we walked home after a long day.
Memories of Mio and Kairos and I fighting side by side against Nyx, both right there always, keeping me safe and guarded.
Then there are memories of him… Erebus. The rush I felt as we slowly fell in love under the stunning backdrop of the stars those nights we’d sneak away to the Earth Realm.
All the nights we made love beneath them when we should have been sleeping.
The night I told him I loved him for the first time, and he told me he knew from the day we met that our love was written in the stars.
He’s the one I’ve always loved. The one I made promises to as I was dying in his arms after we fell from the Realm of Light.
The one I willingly walked over roses covered in vines for in the meadow, because I wanted more than anything to bind myself to him for eternity.
He is my fated mate. I am his and he is mine, always.
Warm tears flow down my cheeks as I open my eyes, my gaze settling first on Kairos and then shifting to Ere.
I step toward him, my heart overflowing with more love than I ever thought could exist. His smile brings me back to the nights under the stars and the way he looked at me the day of our claiming ceremony, so much love and passion he was offering all to me.
How did I not feel it with such certainty even as a mortal?
How could I be so blind? Erebus—he is everything to me.
I throw myself into his arms and he lifts me by my waist and wraps me around him, my ankles locking at the small of his back and arms clamping tightly around his neck.
I never want to let go of him again. The rest of the world drifts away, there are no sounds or people left who exist, no demons hiding within caves all around us. It is only him and I.
“I remember you. I remember everything.” I sob, our lips crashing together as he grips my face and pulls me to him, his tongue and his lips consuming me, claiming me as his. “I’m never leaving you again. I promise.”
His warm golden eyes darken, the crimson and feral glow taking over. “I am yours, Mera. I always have been. You are never getting rid of me.”
“Our promises. I remember,” I whisper.
“Say it.” He smiles, his hands sliding down my body and settling at my hips.
“Until the Underworlds sky shines bright.” I brush my nose against his the way I used to, closing my eyes and breathing in the sweet reminder of our love.
“Until celestial wings are neither black nor white.” His lip twitches, a single tear sliding down his cheek.
“Until the realms are shattered and made anew.” I wipe the tear from his cheek as my own cascade down mine.
“You belong to me, and I belong to you,” he whispers, his voice cracking with all the emotions and memories and love he has had to live with alone for the past century.
The things he had to bury down deep to keep hidden from Nyx so she would continue thinking he was a slave to her manipulation and power.
His lips meet mine and I lose myself again in the moment as everything else fades away. There’s only him and I and nothing more, and there’s nothing I want more than to stay here in his arms forever. Brushing his lips against my cheek, he glances over my shoulder, slowly lowering me to the ground.
Gods. Kairos. I slowly turn to face him, and the look in his eyes, on his face, it’s a look I’ll never be able to forget. The agony and discernable heartbreak seep out of him in tumultuous waves, his energy no longer soothing light and hope, but pure, palpable anger and pain.
“What did you do?” He charges forward palms connecting with Ere’s chest and pushing against him until he stumbles back. “What the hell did you do to her?”
Ere lets out a huff of laughter and shakes his head.
“Mera knows the truth now, Kairos. Memories do not lie. Whatever mind games you and your people were playing with her before can end here and now. It’s over.
I had to resist my urge to kill you when she could not remember you or even me, but now that she does,” he steps forward, shadows snaking across the ground and swirling around them both.
“I am done playing nice, Kairos. This ends now.”
I swallow back tears and pain and anger that rush through me as I consider the possibility that everything Kairos did for me and told me he felt was all a lie, like Ere seems to believe.
But to what end? To keep Ere and I apart?
To gain access to my power? I refuse to believe that. Gods, I need time to fucking think.
I wrap an arm around Eres waist, looking Kairos up and down.
“I think you should go home, Kairos. I don’t know what to make of all of this, but I need time.
” I don’t look away from him, even as his features shift from heartbreak to complete and utter devastation, or when Ere’s shadows slip around his arms and chest, forcing him back when he tries to step toward me.
The shadows drift away but stay close as Kairos comes to a standstill.
I don’t look away, but I don’t show how much my heart is breaking looking at him, either.
. He’s special to me. He brought so much light into my life when all I felt was darkness.
But I need time to process and heal. From the lost, broken look on his face and the tears sliding down his cheeks, I think he does, too. None of this makes sense.
Lightning flashes briefly around his palms, strikes lighting up the dull green within his eyes, but his power flickers out immediately as if he has no energy left to give.
“None of this is real. It can’t be. Love is not a curse.
Fate is not a lie. This…all of this is one huge fucking lie.
Mera, please. You have to believe me.” His tears turn to unrestrained sobs, hands trembling and body swaying as he runs his hands through his hair, falling to his knees in front of me.
“Please don’t do this. Please,” he whispers through the desperate, heart shattering sobs, eyes snapping closed as he tilts his head back like I’m a god he’s praying to.
I crouch and take his hands in mine and he stills, sniffling and wiping at his cheeks with our intertwined hands and then he opens his eyes.
“I hate this. To see you hurting this way.” Keeping his hands in mine, I reach up and brush tear-soaked locks of hair away from his eyes.
“Go home, Kairos,” I whisper. “Get some rest. I’m sure you’ll feel better after you do.
You’ve been through so much. We all have.
We’ll talk soon. I promise.” I give him a small, reassuring smile without giving away how much it truly does kill me to see him this way, because I can’t.
To show him my own pain means showing that I still care, and maybe that would hurt him even more.
Seeing him this way breaks me. He has been lied to.
Manipulated in the worst possible way, and who the hell would want to hurt him?
He deserves so much better. He deserves everything.
But these are problems for another time, when wounds aren’t still fresh and bleeding and entirely too fucking confusing.
I was right before. The truth that was supposed to set me free, doesn’t feel as freeing now with so many truths still unraveled.
I stand and release Kairos’ hands as Ere opens a portal to send him home.
Kairos glares at him, lightning sparking at his fingertips and again behind his eyes as he stands and takes an unsteady step toward him.
“I will burn this entire fucking realm to the ground one day with you in it. I promise you that. You’re wrong.
This is not over. This fucking ends when you are dead. ”
His gaze never leaves me as he steps through the portal, his green eyes piercing through the shadows of the realm. Then he faces forward and doesn’t look back, his soul leaving remnants of his pain and heartbreak lingering within my own.
As soon as the portal snaps closed, I collapse in Ere’s arms, letting my own heart crumble as he holds me against him.
I didn’t want to break in front of Kairos.
I didn’t want to make things harder for him.
But gods, does it hurt. Even if he was lying to me the entire time.
Even if it was all some fucked up game the celestials or gods were playing.
It still. Fucking. Hurts. Ere brushes his thumbs across the tears on my cheeks and then cradles me against his chest, one arm under my knees and the other wrapped around my back.
He carries me all the way home this way, me crying, heart in pieces, never questioning why.
I loved Kairos and he knows it. Of course all of this hurts. But none of it matters now, or at least it won’t eventually. I have my fated mate. The one who was created just for me. His undying love and soothing kindness will continue to carry me through this and anything else that may come our way.
I am his and he is mine, and this is only the beginning of our forever.