Eternal Nights (34 page)

She’d frequently made this journey between the temple and Kale and Meriwa’s residence. Always there were meetings. She’d seen more of the lord and lady in the last five lunar cycles than she had since becoming High Priestess. She consulted with them, their guardians, their advisors, and the Guard Commander. Yet everything they’d tried had failed to end the killings.

This day, she’d made a suggestion that had shocked those present into silence. Kendall had recommended that the lord and lady send the citizens back to their home world.

Never before in the history of their people had a colony returned to its planet of origin. Kendall, however, did not see how they had any choice. How many more must die? They would all have to give up the only home they’d ever known, but they would be alive. After the murderer was captured and dealt with, they could come back.

Kale and Meriwa had been incensed. They’d learned that the killer was an alien stranded on this planet by his own people because he’d repeatedly committed mass murder. The lord and lady had also discovered that the killer believed he was honoring his goddess with the sacrifice of sentient beings.

Kendall tried to comprehend such thinking, but could not.

As she entered the square at the rear of the temple, her eyes naturally strayed to the Guard headquarters for the quadrant. She drew to a halt as she spotted Wyatt standing at the front of the building, talking to a handful of his men. How handsome he was, and how she loved him. Their babe kicked, as if realizing his father stood near, and it was all Kendall could do to prevent herself from rubbing her belly in response.

Her pregnancy was advanced, and her robes would be unable to conceal her state much longer. Were she and Wyatt to be expelled from the city, they—and their babe—would die. There would be no leniency from the lord and lady, and two against this killer—

Someone bumped into her, causing Kendall to lose her balance. The man put an arm around her to prevent her from falling, apologizing profusely for his inattention. When he went still, she knew he’d felt the swell of her child.

“My lady?” he asked, voice incredulous. And as he turned her to face him, she saw confusion, agitation, disbelief, and other emotions she couldn’t identify. Before she could find words to diffuse the situation, anger—nay, fury—mottled his complexion. Roughly, he tore open her robe. The clothes she wore beneath did nothing to hide her pregnancy.

“This,” he called to those around them, “is what has caused our curse!” Anger radiated from him. “Our High Priestess has sinned against Heru, and he is punishing us for her wickedness!”

Disbelief held her in place. Their religion did not teach such doctrine, yet clearly this man’s words had found resonance with the people. They instantly clustered around her.

“That is not true,” she called, speaking loudly to be heard above the angry murmurs. “Heru is love, not vindictiveness. He does not punish—”

“Silence, harlot!” a woman shouted.

“You are not fit to speak the name of Heru,” a man accused.

Another man pushed her, and she stumbled into someone behind her, who pushed her back toward the center. Zolianna—Kendall realized in this life she was called Zolianna—tried to find words to calm the men and women before the situation became even more unstable. “Please,” she said, wishing desperately for her powers back. “Do not take action which will shame you and our people.”

“You’re the one who’s shamed us,” another woman shouted, “and brought this evil down upon our heads! ”

Zolianna found herself fending off slaps and punches. When a rock hit her, she froze, almost unable to fathom such behavior. The second stone nearly hit her abdomen and she fought harder. She could not allow them to kill her babe, she couldn’t!

Then she saw him, her love, shoving his way through the mob. “No,” she called. “Do not!” But either Wyatt—no, his name was Berkant—did not hear her or he chose not to heed her warning.

He put himself in front of her, shielding her as best he could with his body. “Desist,” he ordered. “Leave this woman be. Hurting her will not stop the murders.”

A roar of outrage rose from the throng. “This whore has sinned, and brought the scourge upon us. Stand aside, guardsman, and let us end this abomination.”

Zolianna knew not who had spoken, only that the voice was male. They were going to kill her, and they’d kill Berkant as well if he did not stand aside. “Leave me,” she told him. She could not bear the thought of him dying with her.

“Never,” he told her. “I promised I would always protect you and our babe, and so I shall.”

What was he thinking? Frantically, she looked past him, skimming her gaze over the people standing nearby. As she’d feared, his claim of fathering her child had not gone unheard; word spread in an angry buzz, and the mob became frenzied.

Zolianna could not begin to guess where they’d found so many stones, but the supply seemed nearly endless as they were hurled at them. She was hit time after time, as was Berkant. He continued to shove at the masses, as if trying to clear a path through the crowd that would allow them to retreat.

If she didn’t need all her strength to remain on her feet, she would have told him it was pointless, that there would be no escape. These once-peaceful men and women would either kill them or drive them out of the city to be killed by the murderer. They would not be allowed to slip away.

The mob grew. She saw Berkant stagger, saw the blood running from multiple places on his head, from his body, and wanted to cry. This was her fault, her fault! If only she’d stood up at fifteen seasons and told the High Priestess that she was not innocent, the ostracism would have been a small price to pay to avoid this moment.

Sunlight bouncing off the temple’s capstone blinded Zolianna, but before she could raise a hand to shade her eyes, pain shot through her abdomen, and she doubled over. There was a gush of moisture, and she looked down to see her skirts sodden with blood. Her baby! Berkant’s baby!

The sight of her child’s life flowing from her body impelled the crowd to a new level of madness. It was impossible to fight, impossible to protect herself or Berkant.

He fell, and she caught him, clutched him as she sank to her knees. She was reeling, her own blood streaming into her face. Zolianna blinked to clear her vision and looked into his eyes. She saw Berkant’s soul leaving his body. “No!” she cried. “No.”

Blood. There was so much blood. It soaked her clothes, pooled around them. Not just her baby’s blood, but Berkant’s and her own.

“I love you, Zolianna. Through all eternity.”

“And I love you, always. Always,” she added in a whisper as his body went lax in her arms.

She wanted to cry, wanted to wail over the loss of her child, the loss of her love, but she had no tears. Zolianna bent her head to his and waited for the mob to close in, waited for her own death. With everything she loved gone, she had no more will to struggle against them.

It didn’t take long before the crowd surged forward. Zolianna barely felt the blows—her body, her very soul, had become numb. And as her own spirit started to leave her physical self, she murmured one word. “Berkant.”

*** *** ***

Kendall awoke with a sob. Damn him!

“Bug,” Wyatt said, without a trace of sleepiness in his voice, “what’s wrong?”

“What were you thinking?” she demanded. “There was nothing you could do to stop them! Why did you push your way into the middle of that mob and try to protect me?”

“You’d have me stand back and watch them kill you?”

“Yes! At least then you would have been alive.” Kendall got out of bed and paced the room a few times, trying to force the shakiness, the absolute terror, from her body.

Wyatt caught her on a pivot, holding her arms as he glared down at her. “I’d vowed to protect you, to protect our child. I could no more idly stand by and allow them to stone you to death than you could have let them do the same to me.”

“There were too many of them. You had no chance!”

“I was a member of the Guard, trained in negotiation.”

Kendall shook her head emphatically. “You can’t negotiate with a mob.”

“No, but we came from a culture unaccustomed to violence. It shouldn’t have escalated to murder. Their actions should have shocked them back to reason.”

“You’re talking in circles,” she accused. “First you say you couldn’t let them stone me to death, then you say the horde should have seen sense. Which was it, Wyatt? What were you really thinking to put your life at risk?”

His eyes were molten with his anger. “I wasn’t thinking beyond you. I loved you more than anything or anyone else in the world, and I would dare anything to keep you safe—then and now.”

“You died in my arms,” Kendall accused. “Our child was already lost, and I held you as you died. Did you have any idea what that did to me? To know I was to blame?”

“You weren’t at fault.”

“I was! If my pregnancy hadn’t been discovered—”

“The mob killed us—you, me, our baby—you were not responsible, they were.”

Kendall opened her mouth to rebut, then felt the blood drain from her face as their argument registered. She’d never told Wyatt about her dreams, had never mentioned her suspicion that she was regressing to a past life. He should be confused, wondering why she was mad at him when he hadn’t done anything. “How the hell do you know what I’m talking about?” she challenged.

The expression that crossed his face told her clearer than words that she’d caught him. “How long?” Kendall asked. He released her, took a step back, but she followed.

“Now, Bug—” Wyatt said, trying to calm her, but she interrupted him before he could continue.

“How long have you known about Zolianna and Berkant?”

He grimaced.

“Wyatt?”

“All my life,” he admitted, voice quiet.

For a moment, Kendall could only stare at him. He’d always known about that past existence. She wasn’t sure she wanted to ask this next question, but at the same time, she had to know. “And when did you realize that I’d been Zolianna?”

After a pause, he said, “The night we met.”

Kendall felt a pain start in her chest, and for the first time, she realized that she was naked, that he was too. Moving past him, she grabbed the nightgown from the floor and pulled it over her head. She couldn’t bear being vulnerable in front of him, not any longer, not when he didn’t care about her, Kendall. He wanted Zolianna.

A gasp escaped as she recalled he’d even referred to her as Zolianna the first time he’d kissed her. He’d been half conscious, but it hadn’t been her he desired. No, he’d called for her alter ego, someone she hadn’t been in thousands of years.

Taking a deep breath, she tried not to think about the fact that she was wearing Zolianna’s clothes, that the priestess had donned this very garment to drive Berkant wild. As she’d regressed to—and relived—her death, Kendall had gained full memory of that other life.

Slowly, reluctantly, she turned back to Wyatt. “I am not,” she enunciated every word carefully, “Zolianna.”

“I know that.”

“Do you?” Kendall asked coldly, but then ice was freezing her from the inside out. “You only became my friend because of who I’d been. Were you ever interested in
me?
”

“Damn it, Bug, I love you.”

“You love Zolianna. I just happen to be her reincarnation.”

Kendall saw the heat flare in his eyes. “Wrong.
Berkant
loved Zolianna. I, Wyatt Montgomery, love you, Kendall Thomas.”

“Sure,” she scoffed. “Tell me something. Would you have invited yourself to eat with me, would you have included me in so many of the things you did, if you didn’t know who I’d been?”

He hesitated, and that was all the answer Kendall needed. Whirling away, she tried to escape him, but Wyatt caught her by the arm. “I was hopped up from three months in the field, and I wasn’t fit company for anyone,” he explained. “That’s why my men and I weren’t socializing right then. So yeah, maybe I wouldn’t have moved that fast if I didn’t recognize you, but I would have gotten around to it eventually. I was attracted before I had a clue what kind of connection we had.”

“Why should I believe you?”

“Because I’ve never lied to you.”

Her voice was low, intense, nearly shaking as she told him, “You lied to me every day, every single time we were together, and you didn’t mention that we’d shared a past life.”

“What the hell was I supposed to say? You didn’t remember a fricking thing!” Wyatt tugged her closer, scowled at her. “And it didn’t take me long to figure out the surest way to scare you off was to mention we were lovers in another life.” He gentled his tone. “I didn’t want to lose you.”

Kendall shrugged off his hold and turned. Something, though, caught her eye, and she slowly walked toward it. A round piece of crystal held strings of colored rectangles as they flowed downward. She laughed, not an amused sound, but one of bitter recognition. This calling glass had been a gift from Berkant, and it closely resembled her wind chime.

Although it had been years, Kendall still recalled how excited she’d been to see it in the store window. Since each piece of the chime was handcrafted, the price had been exorbitant. She’d certainly never spent that much money for one item in her entire life, yet she’d begged the reluctant store owner to hold it for her. As soon as she’d gotten a grudging agreement, Kendall had raced to her bank and raided her savings account.

Not once had she regretted the purchase. It had been her dearest possession, the only thing she owned that meant anything to her. Now she knew why.

“You recognize this, don’t you?” she asked Wyatt, swiveling her head to look at him over her shoulder.