11. This Time #2
A guard of skeletal soldiers formed a walkway to a ramp that led up to a set of brass doors into the ziggurat.
Their eyes burned with orange flames. Grayson slowed again, not liking how their bony hands caressed the hilts of their swords.
Roan poked him in the back again, which had Grayson whirling around in anger.
Roan smiled at him, just daring him to do anything.
“Temper, temper, Ashyr. You’re in a rather breakable form right now. Wouldn’t want you to break something,” Roan tutted.
“He best not be broken in any way,” came a boyish, yet powerful voice from out of the mouths of the skeletons.
Roan stiffened. A look of hatred crossed his handsome features, but it was soon smoothed away into one of blandness.
He gestured for Grayson to proceed up the ramp.
Grayson slowly turned around and began walking again.
Before he reached the top, the brass doors swung wide and the interior of the ziggurat was revealed.
The interior was surprisingly cozy. Layers of jeweled-toned rugs were layered over the stone floor.
There were bookcases heavy with books, scrolls, skulls, candles, small sculptures and more lining many of the walls of this main room.
There was a fireplace open to all sides in the center that burned with those strange orange flames.
They weren’t burning wood, but only soul gems. There was no flue necessary for the smoke as there was none yet there was a warmth that wrapped around Grayson in an almost embrace.
He sagged, his steps slowing again, as he felt a deep sense of exhaustion, but also comfort.
He found himself staggering over to one of the large, oversized divans that flanked the fireplace and practically throwing himself across it.
The material was soft and yielding. He breathed in its scent–or maybe it was the scent of the burning soul gems, he couldn’t be sure–which was like cinnamon and cloves.
It almost reminded him of Ryder. Masculine. Safe. He was so tired.
Ashyr? Ashyr?! I don’t think falling asleep here is the plan, Eyros’ voice though was just a buzz in the back of his head.
Grayson found himself falling through waves of amber light. Falling. Falling. Falling. Then blackness. Velvety dark. Surrounding him. Cradling him. Embracing him like the heat had. He’d been here before at this beginning place.
I’m closer to death than I thought, Grayson realized. But no, I must make it back to Ryder. I will be with him. Turned by him. And returned to our king’s side.
He fought against the blackness. He wasn’t sure how he did it.
It seemed to him, at first, as if he had no physical form at all and neither did the blackness.
But then it became thicker, like water, and he felt his arms return and then his legs.
He began to swim towards what he perceived was the surface.
The amber light was up there. He swam and he listened and he heard…
“I don’t understand why you want to question him when I’m right here!” Roan’s voice was a waspish buzz. “I have the Eyros gift!”
“And yet you seem unable to enter his mind at all,” the boyish yet commanding voice retorted.
“It’s dangerous to have him here! We should–”
“Should what? Take his soul and hide it someplace? Then we ensure that I will find it. No, he is our chance to co-exist,” the boyish voice said.
“He hates us,” Roan hissed.
“No, he hates you,” the boyish voice amended. “I believe he’s quite fond of me.”
“It will never work! He will never–”
“It was accomplished with Balthazar and through him to Christian,” the boyish voice interrupted.
“We should tell ourselves about that!” Roan complained. “If I had but known who Balthazar was back then–”
“It’s too far out of the pattern, Roan,” the boyish voice explained patiently, but there was an edge to it. “We go too far and Seeyr will end us. We exist if we stay on the edges.”
“You give her too much credit!” Roan sounded petulant.
“Only because I didn’t give her enough before,” the boyish voice answered. “And we paid for it.”
“You should have destroyed her like the others! Given her to Weryn before he was put away! Have him rip her apart and then–”
“That could never have happened,” the boyish voice was definitely edged now. “Don’t you understand? We are in the future that Seeyr picked.”
“And you think she’ll let this happen?” Roan did not hide his disbelief.
Grayson wondered what this was. He was now treading water just beneath the amber light. That light was full consciousness. He would pop right back into his body if he broke through. But not yet. He wanted to hear more.
“I think,” the boyish voice dropped into an almost sensual whisper, which caused the hair on the back of Grayson’s neck to rise, “that I am done being questioned.”
There was a sharp cry of pain and then the retreating tread of footsteps before the thunk of the brass doors shut.
After that, there was only the crack and hiss of the burning soul gems. He heard one crack open and a sigh–was that the sigh of a spirit as its energy was expelled to feed the flames? –before he felt a hand in his hair.
“Wake up, Ashyr,” the boyish voice said by his left ear.
Grayson broke through the water’s surface into the light before he had a chance to choose it. Kaly had chosen it for him. He drew in a sharp breath as he flew upright on the divan. He drew in deep haggard breaths.
“You poor thing. You’re exhausted. I don’t know how you’ve managed to keep this body alive this long considering the Ever Dark’s hunger for you,” the boyish voice said. “Here. Drink this. It will help. Not as reviving as Daemon’s touch, but it will make you more comfortable.”
Grayson found himself taking a golden goblet from someone’s hand and bringing it to his lips.
He stopped himself from drinking it at the last minute.
The compulsion that this version of Kaly had on his soul breaking as life fully returned to his body.
He brought the cup down and stared at its contents.
It was clear except there was the faintest oily sheen on the top of it.
It smelled of oranges and something bitter underneath.
His gaze left the contents of the cup and gazed around him, looking for the person who had given him this likely poisoned chalice.
What he found–who he found–was not what he was expecting.
There was a teenage boy, wearing a set of orange and black robes, kneeling beside his divan.
He had white-blonde hair that fell in lush waves down to his narrow shoulders.
He smiled, showing a snippet of white teeth, and even whiter, sharper fangs.
“It’s not poisoned! I wouldn’t have had Roan bring you here unharmed if I simply wanted to poison you,” the teen laughed.
He laid his hands on top of his thighs. The robe was parted and showed a disturbing amount of creamy white skin. He was clearly wearing nothing under the silk robe. Grayson found himself tucking his legs up onto the divan so that he didn’t touch this unearthly beautiful boy.
Eyros? Eyros, are you there? Grayson sent.
Nothing.
Good grief. Had Eyros cut their connection and fled when he’d been dragged down into… into death? A near death? Perhaps he’d had to. But why wasn’t he listening now? Grayson felt a prickle of hurt and betrayal. Balthazar would never have abandoned him! But Eyros had…
So I’m on my own? Fine. I’ve done this before.
“Poison? No, I don’t think it’s poison. It probably has some kind of mind control ingredients or something like that,” Grayson said and set the untouched cup down onto the floor.
“Ah, yes, the Ever Dark does provide the most interesting botanicals,” the boy nodded. “But, truly, this is to help you.”
“Forgive me, but I highly doubt that, Kaly,” Grayson said. “Considering you killed me not too far away from this spot.”
“Oh, yes, that. I can understand your anger about that. But I really did it out of necessity,” Kaly answered. “And, of course, you may call me Kaly. For I am them. But others call me Artemis.”
Grayson frowned. Where had he heard that name? Ah, Artemis Alucius! Caemorn’s Master. But how could he be here? Caemorn had absorbed him, hadn’t he? Evidently not.
“Just as I call myself Caemorn in your time. Well, a part of me does. It’s all about preference, I suppose. But either works. Whatever you choose to call me is fine,” Artemis said with a fluted laugh. “And what about you? Would you like me to call you Grayson or Ashyr?”
“It matters not to me,” Grayson said stiffly.
He was surprised at himself. He should be insisting on being called “Ashyr” so that this slice realized he was in the presence of a full and total Immortal. But he found himself unwilling to say one way or the other.
Artemis nodded. “You’re experiencing some of the mental dissonance that we’ve all had taking on these other lives. Which memories are more important? Which defines us? Which ones take precedence? How to weigh the most recent against the majority?”
“You’re comparing dying and being reincarnated to what you’ve done with this slicing?” Grayson lifted an eyebrow.
“It is more similar than you think.” Artemis narrowed his silver eyes at Grayson and smiled. “You know that Roan has little to do with me, let alone Caemorn. We are different people.”
“Caemorn is Kaly. You’re a slice. Roan is a slice,” Grayson replied coldly.
“Caemorn is really the most different from Kaly than us all. You must admit this, Ashyr,” Artemis said. “He is warm where Kaly was cold. He is soft where Kaly was hard. He cares about his sharp edges nicking others while Kaly delighted in that.”
“He’s had different experiences. They’ve changed him,” Grayson admitted.
“Yes, he is not the same as he was. Neither am I.”
Artemis lifted a shoulder and the robe slid to the side, showing more of a muscled arm.
Grayson stared at this open sensuality. Kaly had never seemed like much of a sexual being to him.
Repressed. Uptight. Anxious. Disdainful.
Distant like a cold star. But much the same had been said about him.
Yet this version of Kaly was quite the opposite.
All peaches and cream skin, bright silver eyes, a curling set of plush lips that likely tasted as sweet as they looked.
If Kaly didn’t bite off the lips that touched him, that was.
“Does this form please you?” Artemis looked up through astonishingly thick lashes. “I wasn’t sure it would be, considering your current preferences. But I can always change it to something more of your liking.”
“Preferences? I–I don’t care what you look like, Artemis,” Grayson said and wished he’d called the other Immortal Kaly, but that would not be correct despite what this slice said. Caemorn was Kaly and this was… well, it didn’t matter.
“But surely it does!”
Artemis got up on his knees and put his hands lightly on Grayson’s thighs. Grayson stared down at the almost elfin young man.
“Don’t touch me,” Grayson said.
“But I’m afraid I must. I mean… I wish to. And you’ll wish to touch me, which is why I want to make sure the form I take with you is pleasant in all ways,” Artemis told him. “I’m trying to do this right this time.”
“Do what right?”
Grayson found himself unable to lift his arms to push the young man away. His eyes went to those orange soul gems. There was something about them, something in them, that was sapping his strength, his will, even his life. He found himself calling out to Eyros.
Eyros, please! I need some help here!
But what could the other Immortal do? He was far from here.
There were no Wyvern to teleport him here.
He had no agents in Lasting. He could almost imagine Eyros taunting him with, What?
No longer have faith in Seeyr? But it was one thing to say things like that when one didn’t have a smiling Artemis looking up into his eyes as if he were about to lure Grayson to bed.
“I’m going to turn you, Ashyr,” Artemis said sweetly. “I will be your Master. And nothing can break that bond.” His smile sharpened. “Not the way I intend to do it this time.”