Pure Healing (26 page)

“I release you from your duties as Consort,” she announced without preamble, hands clasped before her, back straight, head high.
The words were like a physical blow, and Valerius barely managed to hold his ground, though his soul staggered from the impact of what she said.
“Why?” he forced out, though he couldn’t hear his own voice for the ringing in his ears.
“You have a more important and urgent duty now, and it will take all of your strength to fulfill,” she answered placidly, as if she’d rehearsed her words beforehand. “I feel better than I have in centuries. There’s no need to complete the Cycle. I can more than accommodate my responsibilities as the Healer with the store of energy you have already given me.”
When Valerius made to object, she put up one hand to still him. “Besides, I find myself in need of solitude.” Her eyes flickered ever so slightly, but her voice did not waiver. “I no longer desire your Service.”
This time, Valerius did falter. Overwhelming pain engulfed him in black, merciless waves. He felt the blood drain from his face, from his limbs. He couldn’t breathe, and his vision began to blur.
Surely she did not mean what she just said! Surely he could change her mind. If he could just take her in his arms, if he could –
“Please leave the Enclosure.” She turned around to face the mural once more.
Valerius swallowed thickly. “Rain –”
“Please leave now. I grow weary.”
Valerius could no longer see for the thick red wall before his eyes. Absently, he rubbed at one eye and realized that the slippery, viscous liquid on his fingers was blood, not tears. He felt twin trails slowly leak out the corners of his eyes down his cheeks.
But before they could drip from the edge of his jaw, he pivoted on his heel, felt his way around the chamber door and left the Enclosure without a sound.
Rain felt his departure with every fiber of her being. The moment his presence was removed from the room, she crumpled like a paper doll onto the floor.
It was for his own good!
she told herself. Both for his health and for satisfying the current situation. It would be selfish of her to keep him by her side, and it would tear him apart physically to carry out both responsibilities of Elite Trainer and Consort. She hadn’t lied about how she felt physically. She was indeed far stronger than she’d been in many Phoenix Cycles, even though they had not yet reached the full thirty days. She was close enough to full strength that, technically, she no longer needed his Nourishment.
But oh how she wanted him!
And therein lay the danger. The more she wanted him, the higher the risk of taking too much from him. In addition, she could no longer distinguish duty from desire. Ayelet had asked her if she loved Valerius.
She did!
To the point she was obsessed with him. She craved his body, his blood, his love-making constantly. She couldn’t look at him, hear him, smell him without wanting him with an urgency and intensity that shook her to the core. She was becoming so dependent on him, so addicted, being apart from him for even brief moments made her want to cry.
She had never felt this way before, not even remotely close. All the passion she’d felt for her first Consort seemed like mere puppy love, yet she recalled the devastation his death left behind with intense clarity. She still bore the scars on her soul.
But did she love Valerius
enough
? Did he love her in return? Could she risk his life and her sanity to find out?
She couldn’t.
Even if he hated her for rejecting him so coldly, even if she had to live with the agony of their damaged relationship forever after this, as long as he was healthy and alive, as long as he was in this world, she could bear it.
Time healed all wounds, did it not? Perhaps she was too sensitive, perhaps he wasn’t hurt by her dismissal at all. For all she knew he was relieved to be freed to do his duty to the Elite to the fullest. He’d never wanted to Serve her. It was an obligation for saving his life.
And she’d get over this addiction. She had to.
Ten years later she would be in someone else’s arms, taking Nourishment from another male’s body. She would not see Valerius in her mind’s eye, she would not dream that it was he who kissed her, filled her, completed her. She could not afford to.
Curling into a small ball, the Healer sobbed herself to sleep.
*** *** *** ***
“Again.”
Sweat pouring down her face as though her very own storm cloud enfolded and followed her with its smothering rain, arms and legs quivering from exertion, muscles so sore they virtually screamed in protest, Sophia speared her opponent with a hatefilled glare.
Letting out a hearty roar that belied her bone-deep exhaustion, she charged at Dalair with her training
spatha
, her light leather shield discarded and forgotten somewhere behind her.
Easily, Dalair avoided her thrust by leaning an inch to one side. Without breaking movement, he shifted his body and used the rotation of his torso to reel Sophia in closer while harnessing her momentum to increase the velocity of her forward fall.
Without a body to absorb the force of her lunge, Sophia found herself pitching forward at an alarming speed. Before she could brace for impact, the ground rose up to meet her face.
Splat. Thud. Whimper. Groan.
She was so sick of that particular sequence of sounds.
“Get up,” came the unrelenting, unsympathetic voice of her tormenter.
“Go fuck yourself,” Sophia muttered against the cold hard floor, her squashed cheek making her words come out in a jumble. But he got the drift.
Dalair squatted on his haunches in front of her face, his crotch within jabbing distance, Sophia thought perversely. Too bad she didn’t have the strength to even attempt unmanning him.
“My Queen,” the Paladin said in his ever-serious tone, lest Sophia thought she was getting beat up for shits and giggles, “you are the weakest among the Dozen. You have the most to learn in a very short period of time. We can’t start at the beginning to teach you technique, we can only drill the responses in you through brute force and repetition.”
He paused, then said, “For every bruise and hit you receive, you can revisit that pain upon me twice over, whenever and however you choose to deliver it. I promise you that justice. But right now, you need to get up.”
Strengthened by the fantasy of her eventual revenge upon the Paladin, Sophia wobbled to her feet, picked up her sword and shield and took the combat stance he taught her.
Dalair took his position as well and crooked his hand.
“Again.”
Two hours later, Sophia flopped flat on her bed like wrung out rags. She was so exhausted she could barely breathe, but the weariness did not numb her countless aches, some in muscles she never knew she had.
Aella quietly came into her room and shut the door. The Amazon pushed Sophia to one side since the girl couldn’t move herself if she tried, and lay down on the massive bed beside her.
“Tough day?”
“Uhn,” came the incoherent reply.
“Hate him, huh?”
Growl.
Aella chuckled softly. “He’s just doing his job, he’s just trying to prepare you thoroughly for battles to come.”
“Ewil.”
“What?” Aella turned her head towards the young Queen.
“He evil. Likes torture.”
The Amazon looked back at the ceiling and kept her smile to herself. “You think he enjoys tossing you around and marking you with blue and black bruises?” “Uhn.”
“But you’ll have your revenge, right? Dalair is nothing if not fair-minded. Surely he will allow you your retribution.”
Some strange sounds came out of the teenager, half cackle half wheeze.
“Then just think of it this way,” Aella reasoned, “the stronger you get, the more potent your revenge.”
More cackling and wheezing.
“I can teach you a few cool tricks tomorrow,” Aella promised, “stuff that is guaranteed to bring any man to his knees.”
“Wuv you.”
Aella rolled to her side to face Sophia, reaching out one hand to smooth the unruly brown tresses from her face. Guilt and worry consumed her as she thought about the danger in which she placed her Queen – by design. She was gambling with Sophia’s life and she and Dalair both knew it. The Paladin barely resisted tearing off one of her limbs earlier when they’d had their happy confrontation before Dalair’s training session with Sophia. He didn’t agree with her methods, didn’t support her plan, but he understood why she put their Queen in such a precarious position.
Aella would die before she let anything happen to Sophia. Dalair knew the depth of her devotion. Only that made him back down in the end.
“Love you too, sweetheart,” Aella whispered and comforted herself with the sounds of Sophia’s deep, even breathing as restoring sleep claimed the young Queen.
*** *** *** ***
Something in the air had changed.
The vampire grew restless and anxious with anticipation. Could it be that its Pure little playmates were beginning to catch on to the rules of the game?
The thought was exhilarating.
They had been such easy prey thus far, moving to and fro according to its will. Even the most patient cat grew bored with toying with stupid mice who just didn’t
get it
, no matter how many clues you threw at them.
Useless little rodents.
But the vampire sensed the shift in its playmates’ positioning and energy, as if they were preparing themselves for the fun to come.
Guess sending the Viking finally roused the white knights to action.
It was well worth the sacrifice. After all, how often did three pawns manage to draw out an entire battalion of Elite warriors?
The vampire eyed its chess set avariciously. Which white knights would be eliminated? In what way? There were so many delicious possibilities.
But the vampire must make the first move. As always. They would be waiting for its opening salvo.
The vampire would make sure it was worth their wait.

Sophia practically limped to class on Thursday afternoon.
Tristan, her designated Elite guard for the day, looked as if he felt twice as bad as she felt. Sophia did not envy him the pain he must be suffering.
Valerius’ training of the Elite over the past three days had been single-minded, relentless, and brutal. Sophia was relieved beyond words not to have him for a trainer. Next to the Protector, Dalair’s instruction was cake walk.
Sophia avoided Valerius as much as possible. She had it on good authority that each of the Elite would too, if they could, but the combat training was not something they could opt out on. Alexandros, in particular, seemed to be less than at his full strength. Perhaps he was still recovering from his wounds, but Sophia sensed a deeper issue, though she could not pinpoint exactly what that was.
Only Cloud seemed to walk out of the grueling sessions relatively unscathed, and he even began to train the others beforehand, so that they would be better prepared for the wrath of the Roman. Perhaps it was because Cloud also specialized in distance combat. Thus he was better able to anticipate his opponent’s moves.
Sophia didn’t know what to make of the black aura around the Protector. It radiated from his skin like an ominous shadow. More than a shadow – it appeared to have a life of its own. It was misery, despair, anger, and loathing all wrapped into one. And at the core of it all, there was pure anguish.
The strange thing was that the tentacles of negative energy seemed inwardly focused, rather than outwardly projected. The obsidian waves consumed his body like a personal black hole, or at least what Sophia imagined black holes might look like.
Bottomless. Fathomless. Light-less.
Lifeless.
She was surprised at first that Valerius spent so much time in training. It seemed to be all he did during the day. At night, he was either with a couple of other Elite warriors hunting or he was conferring with Ayelet, Orion and Eveline. In fact, Sophia hadn’t seen him with the Healer together in one place since their return from China.
Rain, meanwhile, was seldom seen, except with Wan’er in the Shield’s clinic to tend to more severe wounds late at night. During the day, she attended to her human patients with her handmaiden in Chinatown. The timings of her comings and goings allowed her to avoid the other Dozen perfectly. When she was at the Shield, she kept to herself in the Enclosure. Only Wan’er attended her.
Wasn’t the Phoenix Cycle still ongoing?
Sophia was confused. For a while the Healer and her Consort seemed inseparable despite the ten years of tension between them since the first time they met. And now the tension was back.
But it was a thousand times worse.
When Sophia did see Rain, she felt the same bleak aura consuming the Healer that surrounded Valerious. It was not so obvious, but it was nevertheless there. That the Healer was so unsettled and depressed was something Sophia had never seen and never expected. Rain was equanimity and soothing calm personified. Though her Gift only allowed her to heal physical wounds, her compassion, sweetness and inner joy magnified her impact to the spiritual as well.
Only one person was ever able to fluster her, just by being in the same room.
Valerius.
But wasn’t that all over? Didn’t they forge a deep and abiding bond through the Phoenix Rite and Cycle?
Sophia chalked it up to a “lover’s spat.” Not that she knew personally what that meant, but it seemed somehow appropriate. She wished Valerius and Rain would just kiss and make up and have some mindblowing orgies and get over whatever
misunderstanding it was that caused them to behave like melodramatic teenagers. Especially since their “get out of jail free” card was about to expire in a little over a week’s time.
But what did she know? Maybe adults (especially the thousands years old ones) experienced deeper, more profound emotions that were beyond Sophia’s ability to grasp.
With Tristan waiting for her in Harvard yard, Sophia swung into her Ancient Egyptian Civ class and took her habitual spot in the back of the room.
Ere was already there waiting for her.
“Hello Sophia,” he smiled at her in greeting.
Sophia resisted sighing out loud in pleasure at the sound of his voice. She loved hearing him say those two little words. Secretly, she thought about recording his voice whenever they were together so she could play it back at night to lull her to sleep.
But that was a little creepy, even for melodramatic teenagers.
“Hi Ere,” she greeted in return. After the hours she spent helping him with research at his apartment, she was now comfortable enough in his presence to form coherent sentences. Not very elaborate, articulate ones, but at least she rose above grunting and gibberish.
“Did you miss me?” he asked with a teasing quirk of his lips.
“It’s only been four days,” she replied with a slight roll of her eyes, but inwardly she delighted in this almost ritualistic inquiry. He was flirting with her. She loved it when he was flirting with her. Now that she didn’t turn lobster red every time he did it, she enjoyed the teasing so much more.
“One day,” he predicted in a delicious whisper that made Sophia shiver in anticipation, “you will tell me what I want to hear.”
And then he turned toward the front of the class where Professor McGowan launched into his monologue about the Valley of Kings.
Sophia heard the professor’s words, but her sight and thoughts were focused upon the beautiful creature sitting beside her, his knee casually touching hers underneath the table.
He reminded her of ice.
With the indefinable, ever-varying beauty of snowflakes. The perfect, smooth, glossy exterior of glass. There was a cool tranquility about him that both intimidated and comforted. No doubt he could freeze anyone over with one arctic glare. But when his chocolate eyes melted, they sparkled with liquid heat, so compelling anyone would fall under his spell.
Sophia was suddenly reminded of the fire blazing in his living room, making the chamber almost overly hot. What a strange idea that a man of ice would adore the heat.
Similarly, Sophia observed a muted white aura around him, as if he kept his true emotions frozen. But underneath the pale white glow there was an incandescent orange flame, its sparks licking the edges of the ghostly shell, as if it was trying to melt away his icy armor.
More alert than ever to her responsibility of discovering and helping to recruit Pure souls, Sophia assessed Ere with new concentration. He had a Pure soul, she was almost certain of it.
But something was off.
There were times, so rarely she thought she might have imagined it, that he seemed resentful, antagonistic, lost.
She caught only a flash of darkness in his aura when he’d walked past Dalair the first day they met in the school cafeteria. But it made a strong enough impression that Sophia remembered it. If she didn’t know better, she would have read danger and harm in his intentions at the time toward the Paladin. Toward herself, she’d never felt a single negative emotion from him.
In the beginning there was curiosity. Then there was attraction and amusement. And sincere friendship.
She liked Ere. A lot. And she knew without a doubt that he liked her too.
Maybe she would bring up the possibility that he could be recruited with Ayelet and Aella. Definitely not Dalair though. The animosity Ere projected toward the warrior seemed entirely mutual.
“Come to my apartment after school,” Ere leaned in to whisper, startling Sophia out of her musings.
Blinking rapidly, Sophia struggled to formulate a reply. Half of her really, really wanted to go, but the other half was weighed down by duties. She had daily training with Dalair and Aella in the evenings, and she’d feel bad for enjoying herself with a gorgeous guy at his cozy abode, even if all they did was study, when everyone at the Shield was on edge, preparing for Armageddon.
“I can’t,” she said after a while. “I’m kind of busy with stuff right now, but maybe things will get better after a couple of weeks.”
Sophia almost fell backwards in her chair when she felt Ere take her right hand in his left and settle both their hands on his hard thigh.
“Just for an hour or two,” Ere coaxed with his sinful voice, his thumb rubbing sensuously over her palm.
For an iceman, he certainly knew how to melt others, Sophia thought, trying to pull her hand away from the tantalizing heat and friction of his touch.
“I really can’t” she repeated desperately, not sure how long she could stick to her refusal if he kept up his seduction.
Miraculously, he stilled. But instead of releasing her hand, he brought it to his lips and placed a hot, openmouthed kiss upon her sensitive palm.
Sophia was so enchanted by his action and the feelings he evoked that she didn’t care if they were in the middle of class. She wouldn’t have noticed if everyone were staring agape at them. Right now, she felt as if she and Ere were entirely alone, in their own invisible world.
“I will miss you,” he said with resignation and disappointment, even a hint of sadness. But then, as if he pulled a façade back in place, his lips quirked in a small, amused smile.
“Until next time, lovely Sophia.”
Before Sophia could react, Ere had risen from his seat and left the classroom in a few long strides. She didn’t even notice that the class had ended. Suddenly, she was craning her neck to watch after him as his figure became obscured by the throng of students pushing out of the room.
She missed him already.
*** *** *** ***
“Your hair is so healthy now,” Wan’er said as she stroked through the long, silky black mass with Rain’s favorite comb that night. “It fairly glows with blue highlights.”
“Hmm,” the Healer murmured, not really paying attention.
She wondered whether Valerius had finished the day’s training and was back in his chamber or out again on a hunt. Every morning before the first rays of dawn, she would stand for long minutes outside his room, her hand poised to knock on his door.
She only wanted to know whether he was feeling all right, she told herself. Whether he was beginning to gain his strength back. From what she’d seen and heard from the Elite, he’d been pushing everyone to their limits. She just hoped that he was not
overextending himself. Her demands upon him had drained him considerably, she knew.
And she wanted to see him. Preferably when he couldn’t see her. She could not bear what she felt for sure would be in his eyes. Confusion. Resentment. Hurt.
She knew she should have explained her heart more clearly. She knew that there was the risk he misunderstood her letting him go as rejection, but she could not find the words. She did not have the composure nor the courage to pour out her feelings for him.
What if telling him how she felt instigated his own feelings? What if he Fell for her because of her own selfish desires and cravings?
What if he laughed at her, or worse, pitied her for loving her Consort when she’d made him promise not to love her?
“I still say you should have stayed with the Protector for the full course of the Phoenix Cycle,” her handmaiden chided her. It was an oft repeated phrase, and Rain no longer bothered to explain herself. “You are not yet fully recovered, and it’s obvious Valerius is capable of providing more Nourishment. If even half the energy he expends on training were to go to you –”
“You may retire,” Rain abruptly cut her off. “I want to be alone.”
Wan’er paused in the middle of the seventyseventh stroke. “But I am not finished with your hair,” she protested.
“I shall do the rest,” Rain replied, gently taking the comb from her handmaiden. “Go to bed. You are exhausted from tending the human and Pure clinics from dawn to dusk. I should not rely so heavily on you.”
Wan’er tidied up a few things and folded back Rain’s silk coverlet on her bed. “I only wish I had half your Gift,” she said wistfully, “I wish I could more equally share your burden.”
The handmaiden bid her goodnight and left the Enclosure quietly.
And sometimes I wish I didn’t have this role
, Rain thought to herself.
Since meeting Valerius, I wish I were just like any other female, capable of loving a male with her whole heart and spirit.
But in truth, she didn’t know whether it was her role as Healer or an innate flaw that she could not love a male completely. Was it her will to hold back or was it her inherent disposition?
She thought she had loved Fan Li in her human life. When the enemy prince finally grew impatient with the sexual chase she led him on, he’d taken her by force. Brutally. Overpoweringly. Several times a day. He seemed obsessed with her and sensed that she withheld something from him, so he tried to dominate her physically and wring her surrender out of her.
That she never surrendered was probably why he continued to be fascinated by her over the years. But that only made him redouble his efforts to force her into submission.
Through it all, she kept her sanity and maintained her courtesan playfulness and sensuality by thinking of Fan Li. Imagining going back to him when it was all over, getting married like they’d planned and starting a family.
But when that day had finally come, her love for him had not been enough. She’d chosen a cowardly death. She hadn’t been strong enough to live with her pain, humiliation and self-derision.
And then there was her first Consort. To this day she couldn’t speak his name, even in her own mind. She hadn’t been looking for love; it was the farthest thing from her mind at the time. All she wanted to do was her duty as the Healer. Use the Gift the Goddess had granted her to its fullest. What love she had she wanted to give to her people, and to all the wounded, ailing, and mistreated.
But
he
had tempted her as a woman. She had been both fascinated and frightened by the side of her that he brought out that she never knew she possessed.
A carnal side. Sexual, greedy, covetous.
A whimsical side. Playful, teasing, laughing.
She had thought, surely, this was the male she was destined to be with. He’d helped her grow and heal so much. And he loved her. He wanted her forever.
But she had failed him. After he’d given her so much, she’d utterly betrayed him. Though she tried everything to funnel her healing energy into him during his Decline, nothing worked. He was not a patient she could fix. Whatever he needed from her she couldn’t find a way to give him.
Maybe she was broken, Rain thought numbly as she put the comb down. Or maybe she was simply a selfish coward.
Moving as if her body had a mind of its own, she rose from her seat before the vanity and left the chamber, making her way quickly down the twists of corridors to Valerius’ room.