Aurora's Promise (32 page)

Releasing Connyn from his gaze, he turned and picked up the
medallion again. “I had no idea that she took the fact that we hadn’t had a son
in the first year as another sign she should have died with her family, freeing
me to take another.” He shook his head ruefully and said more to himself than
to Connyn, “As if I could have ever taken another woman as my mate.”

When he again looked at Connyn, his gaze was clear, free of
remembered pain. “Looking back, I can see it as a blessing that she wasn’t
pregnant at the time of her family’s death. Her grief was so deep, I’m not sure
it wouldn’t have cut you from her womb right then. As it was, she had struggled
with her beliefs for an entire year, not wanting to accept that her destiny
included a mate whose insensitivity and arrogant conceit could possibly have
helped shape her destiny and so, her part in the fulfillment of the prophecy.”

He took Connyn’s hand and placed the medallion in it,
holding Connyn’s hand in place when he tried to pull away. “Just as it’s
difficult for you to accept that Aurora’s magic and non-Ilyrian heritage are
part of what shapes and completes your destiny.”

Folding Connyn’s fingers around the family medallion, he
said, “You could not be your mother’s son and not believe in the prophecy. Her
very life is proof of destiny. A destiny that has been rooted in your heart
from birth.”

“But the truth—”

“Finding the truth, the whole truth for one’s life, is up to
every individual. It’s not up to destiny and the gods alone. It can only be
found if one is persistent.”

Connyn raised his eyebrows at his father. “You’ve been
persistent?”

Cyn inclined his head. “A trait I’ve passed on to my son. Along
with the deep passion for fulfilling destiny he received from his mother. But just
finding it isn’t enough if one does not accept it when it is found.”

The expression that crossed his father’s face suddenly drew
several threads of the conversation together for Connyn. “Accepting the truth.
Is that what the sunrise means to you and mother?”

An enigmatic smile lit his father’s face. “That’s where it
started. That first day I actually learned the truth but still had to choose
whether or not I would accept it.”

“And now?”

“Now I believe you have a mate you need to find and
apologize to. Keep the medallion.” Dismissively, Cyn turned his back on Connyn
and returned to the sitting room. He was settling back into the chair he’d been
occupying previously when Connyn followed him in from the balcony. Gesturing to
the items on the table his father said, “These you may pick up later.”

“What do you mean I have a mate to apologize to?”

His father frowned. He recognized that expression. It was
the same one he saw often as a child when he didn’t grasp a concept or skill as
quickly as his father expected. “Do you love her?”

Shock rocked through Connyn.
Love.
It was not a word
he’d ever heard his father utter before. Ever. “I fail to see the relevance—”

His father rubbed his eyes. “No wonder your mother won. You
are too much like me for her not to know how you would react.” Before Connyn
could respond, Cyn gestured toward the door. “Never mind. Find your mate.
Fulfill your part of the prophecy. Work on understanding your woman.” Wry humor
sparked in his eyes. “That should keep you busy for some time.”

“What the hell is going on here?” Wyc bellowed as he and
Rordyc stormed into the inner courtyard of his private quarters. Wyc and Rordyc
immediately moved to flank Connyn, staying close enough to be able to stop him
before he could get to their mates, but far enough away to stay out of his
immediate reach.

Connyn didn’t care, didn’t so much as flinch. He remained
coldly staring at Bethany and Brooke standing shoulder to shoulder behind a
line of Wyc’s personal guards. “Tell your guards and mates to move.”

“Not until you explain what the hell is going on. Bethany,
are you all right?”

“No! I’m furious! Tell him to leave.” She placed a
protective hand over her stomach and looked meaningfully at her mate. “You know
I’m doing my best to not become overexcited.”

“Brooke, are you hurt?” This from Rordyc whose stance
visibly loosened once his mate shook her head.

Wyc stepped in front of Connyn. “Do you mind telling me why
you are so insistent on breaking into my bedroom?”

“Your mates have kidnapped Aurora.”

“
Kidnapped
?!” Bethany shrieked as she pushed between
two of the guards. Wyc caught her around the waist and stopped her advance. “She
came to us for help because you threw her out!”

Wyc frowned. “You threw her out?”

“No.”

Turning to his mate, Wyc asked, “So why are we standing in
front of the bedroom?”

“I didn’t expect him to come
here
. Well, maybe to our
home since I was with Aurora after the Council meeting, but he walked right in
and commanded me to open this door.
This
door.”

Wyc returned his glare to Connyn. “You entered my home
without permission?”

Another cord tying Connyn’s impatience to his control
snapped loose. “Bethany allowed me entrance,” he snapped.

“Did you?” Wyc asked Bethany.

Bethany’s expression was mutinous as she crossed her arms
over her swollen belly. “That is not the salient point here.”

Wyc glanced behind him at the closed door. “Aurora is in
there?”

Tilting up her chin, Bethany clamped her lips shut and
glared steadily at an indeterminate point over Wyc’s shoulder.

With a sigh, Wyc’s stance eased and his voice softened. “Babydoll,
maybe this is a good time to tell you that Connyn can see through walls.”

Bethany’s jaw dropped and her green eyes rounded comically. “
What?”
Immediately she recovered her anger. “It doesn’t matter. Aurora can stay here
as long as she wants. Aurora was doing her best to protect her niece.
My
niece.
And he called her a liar in front of the Council. Unmated her in front of everybody.”

“Unmated her?” Wyc’s lips twitched as he suppressed a smile.

Bethany’s eyes narrowed to thin slits of fury. “Yes.”

Wyc turned to Connyn. “I’ve heard different versions of the
events this morning, but no one has mentioned vows being renounced.”

“They were not.” Connyn’s voice was flat with the effort it
was costing him to remain in place rather than tearing his way through flesh
and armor to reach his mate he could clearly see standing at the far end of the
bedroom on the other side of that door.

“Does Aurora believe you don’t want her?” Rordyc asked.

“I don’t know. I haven’t been allowed to speak with her,”
Connyn growled.

“Well,” Rordyc probed, “did you call her a liar?”

“There was a misunderstanding stemming from the sudden
knowledge that my mate was not from Ilyria and had the power to hold the
Prophets and Elders motionless against the wall while calling forth a storm of
wind and fire in the middle of the Hall of Council.”

Rordyc winced. “That would do it.”

“It would
not
do it,” Brooke insisted before Bethany’s
outraged gasp could change to words. “Besides, if he was truly sorry, it wouldn’t
have taken him so damn long to get here.”

Connyn leveled his gaze on Wyc. “I had things to do. I
believed I had failed my House.”

“Things to do?” Bethany snapped. “What could be more—”

“Bethany.” Wyc’s voice cut across her newest rant, the
warning in his tone severe enough to have two of his guards shifting slightly
behind him. Without turning his back on Connyn, he signaled to the line of
guards. They immediately exited the room.

“Wyc—” Bethany began, staring disbelievingly at the backs of
the retreating men.

Brooke stepped forward to join the other three once the
guards no longer blocked her from them. “He treated her abominably,” she said. “He
called her a
vystra
.”

After a rapid look of surprise was exchanged between Rordyc
and Wyc, Rordyc cocked an eyebrow at his mate’s announcement and brushed it off
with a slight, one-shouldered shrug. A decidedly stubborn expression settled on
Brooke’s face. “All I’m saying is that he shouldn’t be upsetting her,
especially in her condition.”

Both Wyc and Rordyc tensed, turned and stared at Brooke. “What
condition?” Rordyc commanded.

Brooke’s eyebrows pulled together in worry. “She’s pregnant,
of course.”

“
What?
” The roar came from all three men, but Connyn’s
overrode his cousins’ as he took a threatening step toward Brooke.

Bethany and Brooke jumped at the men’s shouts and backed up
together against the door, now barring it not only from Connyn, but from their
own mates.

Brooke found her voice first. “She didn’t know because she
didn’t understand the portal jumping puking thing. And she’s been wearing a
patch—”

“A what?” asked Rordyc.

“A patch, you know, birth control.”

“She tried to shield herself from me?” Connyn asked. He
thought after all the revelations this morning, Aurora would be fresh out.

“Not from you particularly. Just
men,
” Bethany
explained.

“Men? What men?” Connyn’s words snarled through clenched
teeth.

“Oh my god.” Bethany propped her hands on her hips. “You are
missing the point. Again. You had to have known she was pregnant. She said she
was deathly sick each time she stepped through a Gateway portal.”

“She didn’t tell me. And she was out cold when I brought her
back from the last one.”

Wyc looked at Bethany. “Are you sure? Absolutely sure?”

“Yes. But it doesn’t matter,” Bethany rushed on when Wyc
took a step toward her. “She doesn’t want to talk to him.”

“It matters very much, babydoll. You should know that.”

“You too,” Rordyc said, taking Brooke by the hand and
pulling her into his embrace. He wrapped his arms around her and whispered, “Remember
the little misunderstanding we had? You should since you gave me a black eye
over it.
”

“It’s not the same thing,” Brooke insisted, leaning her face
away from him but not struggling enough to break free of his arms.

“True,” Rordyc said. “She obviously hasn’t head butted him
in the face yet.”

“I won’t let him take her if she doesn’t want to go,”
Bethany stated, her stance widening in defiance as her shoulders pressed against
the door.

“No, of course not,” Wyc agreed.

Connyn growled, his patience at an end.

“But now,” Wyc said, reaching for her, “it’s time for the
man to talk to his mate.”

Aurora heard the door close with a quiet
whoosh
behind her and then the heavy footsteps of a man. The muscles along her
shoulders and neck tightened painfully, but she didn’t turn around. She didn’t
have to. She knew who it was.

“Are Bethany and Brooke all right?” she asked.

“Of course.”

“You didn’t hurt or threaten them?”

“I did not hurt them. No more than I would hurt my own mate.”

At that she spun around. “Well, we don’t know what that
means since you have yet to find your mate.” He was surprised to see she was
still wearing all the jewelry, though the dark smudges around her eyes seemed
darker, deeper. Her face was pale and strained, her normally lush, soft lips
drawn into a thin line.

His heart rammed against his ribs. He felt the pain of it
crack through his bones with the cruel cadence of regret.

“What?” she asked when he didn’t respond.

He couldn’t stop looking at her. Absorbing her. “You’re
beautiful.”

Aurora’s eyes widened in surprise. And then she turned her
back to him, straightening her spine. “You need to know I’d do it again for
Chloe and Amy. In a heartbeat.”

“I know,” he said moving silently toward her across the
large room. After living all his life labeled a zealot by his cousins, he did
understand extremes. Understood the choices one had to make to fulfill or even
create destiny. All the heirs understood to some extent.

Connyn covered the final distance to her in two steps and
settled his hands on her shoulders. She stiffened and tried to shrug them off.
He rested his forehead on the top of her head and inhaled the soft aroma of
flowers that scented her hair. Though he kept his grip light it remained firm
and unmoving. He knew he should release her, give her time to accept him and
cool down but he couldn’t bring himself to not touch her. “Forgive me,” he
whispered.

Suddenly the block of cold stone she’d become under his hands
turned into a hissing, furious, twisting tornado. “Don’t you
dare
! After
the way you accused me!” Jerking out of his grip, she whirled around to stare
at him, her wide eyes wild with dark fire. Fisting her hands she held her arms
straight at her sides, tensed and vibrating with her fury. “A
joke!
You
said I thought your world was
a joke!”
Tears rimmed her lower lashes.
She blinked them away and tossed her head, throwing strands of her hair back. “Hell
will freeze over before I forgive you.”

“I can live with that.”

For a moment she looked like she wanted to scream at him,
then deflated before his eyes. Rage evaporated into an exhaustion that etched
itself into her face as her entire body sagged. She rubbed at the line that had
formed between her eyebrows, suddenly looking fragile enough to shatter at the
slightest touch.

He closed in on her, needing to hold her, enfold her in his
arms. In alarm, Aurora immediately started backing up. She didn’t stop until
she hit the balcony’s railing. With a little waver of panic himself, he watched
her glance over her shoulder, judging the distance to the ground. Before she
had a chance to make a decision, he had her wrapped securely in his arms. She
glared up at him and her words hissed out on the end of her anger. “Do
not
make fun of me.”

Cradling her head with one large hand he said, “I wasn’t
making fun of you. In Ilyria, our version of Hell
is
frozen. It’s
already a done deal. Just like us.”

“Jesus.” Her head dropped to his chest. “We’ve already
covered this. Remember?” she mumbled into his shirt. “I gave you your
out-clause. You don’t have to do this. I officially set you free to find a true
Mystic. Now please go away. I’m tired and I don’t want to talk to you,” she
said her voice weary and bleak.

He ignored her statement. Combed his fingers through her
hair. “Brooke and Bethany were quite upset that I had called you my
vystra.
”

“I might not have been clear about the tone you used.”

“I gathered that,” he said dryly.

“It’s not like you’ve ever explained it to me and neither of
them had heard the term either.”

Taking a deep breath that lifted her head from where it
rested on his chest, he let it out again on a deep sigh. “Vystra is the goddess
of life, the giver of breath. The Vystral Virgins are priestesses who serve in
her temple.”

His fingers slipped up around her neck, caressing her nape.

“So I’m your priestess? That makes me feel
so
much
better. Though the virgin part is pretty much a wash.” The disgruntlement in
her voice made him smile.

“When a man calls a woman his
vystra
, he’s admitting
that she’s his breath, the very essence of his life. That he needs her to live.”
He used his thumb to tilt her head up so he could look into her face. “That
I
need you to live.”

Her eyes were fatigued and dull as she stared up at him. “It’s
a little late for pretty words, don’t you think?” Lifting her chin from his
gentle grasp, she looked away from him. “I saw the look on your face when you
realized, I mean really
got
it that I wasn’t a Mystic. Wasn’t your mate.
It changed everything between us.”

She shrugged and when her shoulders fell, it was as if her
arms were yanked down by heavy weights. “It was inevitable since everything was
based on a lie.” Her voice cracked on the last word and she pressed her lips
together when they started to tremble. Tears began to slide like liquid crystal
down her cheeks. “I didn’t mean for it to go this far,” she whispered. “It
never was my intention to hurt or embarrass you or your family. I hope you will
be able to accept that. Eventually.”

She shook her head and blinked away the remaining tears.
Resolve edged into her voice as she said, “But it’s all for the best, being out
in the open. You can do a formal disavowing or whatever you call it and get on
with your life. I can start looking for a place for Amy, Chloe and me.”

He felt it through the deepest part of his soul, a ripping,
slashing scream, a total abjuration of her final words. For an eternity he
seemed to stand there, standing against the rage that rocked through him,
standing against a cruel twist that threatened to steal the future he’d fought
and lived for. Cradling her head in his hands, he tilted her face to look up at
him, making no attempt to hide the desire or emotions rioting within.

Lifting her hands, she held on to his wrists but didn’t try
to pull his hands away. She simply held on. “Don’t worry. I’ll make sure
everyone knows it was my fault.”

“You are missing several important pieces of information,”
he said. His gaze dropped to her mouth when he skimmed his thumb over her
bottom lip. He wanted with his entire being to lay his mouth over hers and just
let the desire take them both to where they belonged, but he knew it wasn’t
what she needed. Yet. “First, I never did plan to renounce you as my mate.”