Chapter 22 Mysteries of the Heart #2
‘They freakin’ committed academic fraud,’ Selene said, half-exasperated, part-impressed.
‘Despite being carbon copies, they’re polar opposites in the classroom.
Jax is an ‘A’ student in English, painting, and history, while Leo excels in calculus and advanced physics.
So, Leo spent Thursday morning knocking out a triple-weighted math exam for Jax, whilst Jax sat in the art studio and produced a hyper-realistic landscape for Leo’s portfolio.
They didn’t get discovered until the art teacher found ‘Leo’, who all of a sudden knew how to use a palette knife without stabbing himself.
The mathematics professor realized ‘Jax’ was done an hour early with his test and was lobbing paper balls at others because he got bored.
Kainan tried to look stern when we picked them up, but I caught him fist-bumping them in the flyer.
I’m raising tiny, genius delinquents, Sheba, and my husband approves. ’
Sheba laughed so hard her ribs hurt.
‘I’ll take your twin devils over Sacran possessiveness any day. Sante, sis. I needed the giggle.’
As Sheba climbed the stairs back to her apartment, a warm, yeasty scent hit her before her key touched the lock.
Inside, Idan was at the kitchen island, his massive frame casting a shadow on the ceiling as he worked a mound of dough, his knuckles dusted with flour, his focus locked in.
‘Decided to come back?’ he rasped without looking up.
‘Are you going to be less of a jackass?’
He glanced at her, nostrils flaring, eyes blazing, before he twisted his lips and simmered down.
She took it as his partial surrender.
‘Midnight baking?’ she asked, dropping her keys on the console.
‘I can’t stay still,’ Idan rasped, eyes on his kneading. ‘My mind won’t let me.’
Sheba walked over, resting her hip on the counter across from him.
‘We need to talk, Idan, about this wall you’re building around me. It’s too much.’
Idan’s jaw tightened. He rolled the dough into a ball, tucked it into a bowl, and covered it with a damp cloth. Moving to the sink, he scrubbed his hands under the hot water.
He dried them, then leaned onto the countertop, crossing his arms over his chest.
After a beat, he took a deep inhale.
‘It feels like I’m losing my grip on my life,’ he admitted, his timbre rough.
‘I lost Sacra. Now I’m away from the farm.
Sulfiqar’s meddling means I’m not sure I even have a future because his potency might be beyond what Molan and I can handle.
Restraining what happens to you, the one soul I care the most for, is the only way I feel like I have any say in this fokkin’ uncertain future.
I’m worried that if I let go of you, too, everything will fall apart. ’
Sheba rounded the counter and reached for him, her hands encircling his waist, tilting her face to gaze up at him.
‘I get the impulse, honey. I really do. But when I tell you I’ve got this, you have to believe me.
If you’re this stressed out, you need to deal with that worry inside yourself instead of making me prove I’m okay to calm you down.
Sharing your fears is fine, that’s just part of being together.
However, limiting me so you feel better is not acceptable. ’
She paused, her gaze steady. ‘In other words, my love? Stop trying to run the whole show.’
Idan stared at the floor, the silence stretching out between them.
He shook his head, realization crossing his face.
‘I’ve been obsessing over you because I haven’t been dealing with my own crap.’
Sheba nodded. ‘Honey, if you take care of yourself, you won’t have to manage me. You’re ignoring your own healing and dumping it all on me instead. Be strong for me when I ask for it, not because you think I’m too weak to handle life. You need to trust me, not hover over me.’
A small, pained smile touched Idan’s mouth. ‘Fokk me. I thought I was being the perfect protector, but you’re the one shielding me from my foolishness.’
‘Thank my sister for the reality check, but yeah, show me some appreciation too,’ she replied with a grin.
‘I am grateful,’ he growled, the tension snapping. ‘I’m also sorry for crowding you and your decisions. What I thought was ‘looking out for you’ was caging you. Trusting you to handle yourself is not easy for this not-so-divine Nihil-Stalker, but I’m going to do it. Forgive me?’
She pursed her lips, narrowed her eyes, and tilted her head.
‘You’re forgiven.’
He jolted. ‘Just like that? How are you just letting this go? I was bracing for you to wreck me.’
‘Babe, I was never gunning for you. I was just sad, because I thought you lost sight of who you are, who we are.’
Idan shook his head, his mouth twitching. ‘Stars over Sacra, you’re a wise, sweet, amazing woman. That’s why you’re a goddess above all, and my forever queen.’
He stepped closer, snagging her waist as he pulled her flush against his rock-hard body.
His lips crashed onto hers, the kiss desperate and grounding.
Within seconds, the kitchen floor was a mess of discarded clothes.
Idan lifted her on top of the marble counter, plumping her breasts, his mouth latching onto her nipple, while his other hand eased between her thighs.
Moments later, he slid lower, parting her pussy lips and making her writhe and moan as he drove her wild and brought her to pleasure.
Eventually, as the city lights bled through the expansive windows, Idan carried her to bed.
As he wrapped himself around her, Sheba tilted her head back to meet his glowing eyes. ‘Does this mean I’m on the mission to Rhesia?’
Idan studied her for a long beat, the internal struggle evident in his aureate gaze until he gave in with a sigh and chin raise.
‘Naam. You’re in, but if things get ugly, I’m going to have a hard time not tearing up this universe for you.’
‘Yes to that part of the deal,’ she laughed, tracing the line of his jaw. ‘With two gods at my side, what could go wrong?’
The Máashìi surged through the pressurized silence of hyperspace, a silver needle threading the fabric of the cosmos.
Inside the galley, Sheba sat at the circular table for breakfast.
She played with the handle of her cup of kahawa while the two pillars of brooding intensity flanking her, Idan and Molan, also finished their beverages.
Bummed to be left out of the adventure, Rina had nonetheless remained on Eden II, caring for her young child.
Molan, a quiet man most times, was downright taciturn without her by his side.
Idan, however, seemed preoccupied with the upcoming meeting.
As if on cue, Mirage’s appeared with the mission brief.
She was all a glitter in an emerald diamante-studded camo jumpsuit and heeled boots.
‘Did I miss the dress code memo?’ Sheba asked, glancing down at her sober navy top and trousers, hair tied back, makeup minimal.
‘Honey, you know I love to switch it up, whenever I can,’ the demi-urge winked.
‘Now, sit up and pay attention, folks. This dossier is classified. Our arrangement with the Draquis Order depends on our discretion. They are the Cinder-Born, and live in a shadowy world of subrosas, and don’t take too well to anyone sharing the secret of their identities. ’
Sheba leaned forward as Mirage flicked on a glowing aqua holo display, opening a file with images and intel.
‘Each member of The Draquis is rumored to be over a thousand years old. They emerged from the charred remains of a massacre when ancient foes within the Paladian empire slaughtered the Dross families of the seven lower-caste men in a purge. They forged a brotherhood from the ruins of a civilization that despised them. For a millennium, they’ve transmuted their grief into lethal ambition, evolving into daemons of war who seized the noble titles once held by the Paladians who discarded them. ’
‘They are now Rhesia’s most potent unseen influence,’ Mirage continued.
‘Yet they remain street-born rebels beneath their tailored black silks. They’ve mastered a dual existence: a public empire of luxury jewelry and elite clubs, and a shadow facet of brutal military discipline.
They revived Paladian alchemical secrets to forge star-gems and defense shields far more precise than any familiar technology.
By harnessing stellar energy, they have expanded their reach across half the galaxy.
Treat them with the highest respect, and you’ll receive the same in return.
Betray them, and they’ll scorch your atoms to ash. ’
With that exhortation, Mirage glimmered away to finalize the meeting location while the trio mulled over the dossier.
‘These kinais sound like badasses,’ Molan rasped as the gravitas of the impending encounter sank in.
‘Naam, never underestimate them,’ Idan muttered.
‘Sacrans, gods as we may be, we learned to avoid any Paladian, on this plane of mortal existence and on the immortal battlefields. Our asses got handed to us by them eons ago on The Shattered Cluster Maw Firmament, and we’ve never forgotten the humiliation. ’
Once the meal concluded, Molan retreated to the crew quarters, lost in pensive thought, muttering about calling Rina.
Sheba and Idan ascended to the bridge for their watch, stepping into a cockpit bathed in the violet radiance of the instrumentation.
Through the viewscreen, space appeared almost ethereal, caught between the internal glow of the consoles and the silver shards of light bleeding in from the void.
Through the panoramic viewport, hyperspace was a chaotic river of incandescent white, a blurred rush of stars tearing through the velvet expanse of the deep dark.
Mirage, at the controls, acknowledged them with a raised chin.
‘Have at it, you two. The ship is on autopilot. Idan, you’ve got the captain’s seat. I’m taking a few hours for my node to regenerate while working through a series of simulations.’
‘Sante,’ Sheba said with a smile and a wave as Mirage vanished.
The couple settled onto the cushioned double crash couch.
Idan pulled Sheba into the heat of his chest, his arms a solid, warm barricade against the isolation of deep space.
She turned in his embrace, her hands framing his face as she sought his mouth.
They kissed, a slow, unhurried exchange that tethered them to the present moment, as the ship carried them toward the mysterious heart of the Draquis empire.