Sentinel of Heaven (20 page)

He rubbed his
thumb over her knuckles, then glanced up at her from under his lashes.

“I don't know
where this was going,” she said, suddenly embarrassed.  “This is back from
before stories had morals, I guess – other than 'if you're nice-looking, don't
go to Athena's temple'...  I don't really have to talk, do I?”

He shook his
head.

Moira gave up
and stared at him instead, drinking in all his details, wondering how it must
look from the outside: two people holding hands, gazing silently at each other
across the little round table, almost like they were in love.

The young
waitress came back with their plates, startling her out of her meditative
contemplation of his features.  Leo accepted his brunch with obvious
anticipation – it made her laugh to see him unwrap silverware that looked like
a doll's utensils in his grip, and delicately but with great intent begin to
slice the crepe.

“I should
watch
you
eat this time,” she said archly; he shot her a sly look and
flipped his fork dismissively in her direction: tend to your own meal!

He swirled the
bite of crepe in its cream sauce, speared one of the dark cherries and popped
the whole morsel into his mouth with fairly impressive table manners, then let
his eyes roll back expressively as he chewed.

“That good,
huh?”

He nodded
again, the very picture of bliss.  She ate a bite of her french toast and
barely seemed to taste it.

I'm glad
he doesn't eat often,
Moira thought,
because seeing him enjoy
something like this is probably criminal.
  Leo ate with a languid sensual
indulgence that someone else might display when listening to a piece of lush
classical music, or spending several minutes examining a beautiful oil painting
– with no real human hunger but a yearning all the same, desiring the
experience for the intrinsic joy of itself and not for the satisfaction of some
basic survival need.

“Can I try a
bite?” she asked when he was halfway through; she was curious to see if it was
really as good as his demeanor suggested.  Leo responded positively, setting up
a forkful and conveying it deftly to her lips.

Oh, it was
good.  Very good.  Better still, however – the sensation of him feeding it to
her and watching her avidly, searching her face for the same enjoyment he'd
felt.

She let him
see all the emotion, and let him think it was caused by the food.

“Want some of
mine?” she asked, once she allowed the morsel to melt away in her mouth.

He nodded and
leaned forward to let her feed him the same way, quick and fastidious with his
tongue, catching an errant drop of syrup on his lip.

She chuckled
low and warm as she watched his face, feeling a blush rise in her cheeks.  The
nearest women turned toward her almost unwillingly at the sound, then away
. 
Has my hair become snakes?
Moira mused.  She laughed again, feeling drunk
and powerful.

He ate even
slower now, studying her between bites, his eyes huge and luminous.  The high
windows at the front of the bistro framed the sun in this moment, and a ray
sought him out and played along his hair.

Are there
other men here?  If so, I must not have seen them.  All I see is him, and all
the others like me who see him too.

She looked
from one side to the other and examined his reflection back and forth, his
strong profile and the massive hand that held the fork so precisely.  Giving a
quiet sigh he slipped the last cherry between his lips, setting the fork onto
the plate with only the slightest noise.

“Had enough?”
Moira asked.  He nodded with great satisfaction and took a sip of her water
glass.

“That's what
you
think,” she said, and raised her hand for the waitress.  “Bring me one of those
lemon tarts for dessert, please,” she told her.

“And for the
sir?”

“Sir will
watch me eat it,” Moira answered, with eyes only for Leo.

The waitress
took their empty plates; the air felt like it sizzled between the two of them. 
Leo folded his hands politely on the tablecloth before him but his gaze was
anything other than civilized.

After a moment
a smaller dish was set in front of Moira, with a silver fork so dainty it
looked more like a piece of jewelry than an eating utensil.

“The thing
about the lemon tarts here at La Maupin, the thing that I remember and love,”
Moira murmured, as if confiding a scandalous secret, “is the glaze.  Oh, do not
mistake me – the crust of the tart is to die for; rather like a baklava pastry
instead of a pie crust or a graham cracker crust, light and perfectly fluffy.”

Her hand did
not stir from its place, resting upright with her wrist against the edge of the
table as her mother had taught her thirty years before.  It did not move one
iota towards the fork.

“And the
filling, oh... the filling is as airy as a sigh; the citrus flavor is sweet at
first and then turns fast as a snake to lash the tongue with a tart bite.  And
I need not mention the hand-whipped cream, or the perfect curls of lemon zest –
no.  Those need no mention.

“But the
glaze... thick and clear as a stained glass halo on the head of a stained glass
saint.  If the sunrise over the ocean had a flavor, it would taste like this
glaze.”

Moira could
have laughed, if she had not been so dreadfully serious – the craggy
warrior-poet before her, in his civilized shirt and his pulled-back mane, was
watching her filled with what appeared to be several different lusts.  Not all
of them were conflicting.  He bit his lip and looked from her face to the tart
and back again.

Almost
casually, Moira picked up her fork.  She slid it through the glaze, quick but
reverent, and let it sink all the way through the crust which was as fluffy as
she'd described.  She dipped the back of the tines in the dollop of whipped
cream and sailed it slowly into her mouth.

She met his
eyes and exhaled like a woman in the grip of ecstasy; he inhaled reflexively
and swallowed hard.

“You should
see your face,” she told him with a smile, once she'd finished the first bite. 
He blinked and shook his head, never looking away.

Moira ate the
tart dreamily; no longer caring who watched, how they watched, or what they
saw.  She mused that this was quite possibly the most fun she'd ever had with
all her clothes on.  She got down to the last carefully cut bite – it had what
she'd consider the perfect ratio of all its parts.  If ever there was an ounce of
tart that could represent the entire pastry, it would be this one.

“Open your
mouth,” she purred; he responded in perfect delirious obedience.  When he
closed his lips she withdrew the fork, watching his eyelids flutter.  He met
her gaze again.

“Good, huh?”

He leaned back
in his chair and stretched, savoring the bite along with her mischief, then
sampling her water glass once more and passing the napkin across his lips.

She raised her
hand again.  “Let's have the check, please.”

The little
leather folio was duly brought; she smiled carelessly at the number and pulled
out her wallet, tucking a few more fragrant twenties into the pocket and
standing it up on the far curve of the table.

When she
looked up Leo was holding the little bud vase that had been the table's
centerpiece.  It contained a sprig of greenery and a two-toned rose that began
as golden yellow at the base of each petal and became deep crimson at the tips.

“That has to
be a hot-house flower; you can't get roses to bloom in November otherwise, even
in Georgia.”  She set her cane between her knees and rested her elbow on it,
putting her chin in her palm.  “That rose has probably never seen the sun,
never felt the wind or embraced a bee...”

Leo's gaze
snapped up to hers, a strange emotion dawning in his eyes.  After a heartbeat
she recognized it as alarm.

“'With petals
tight, the bud embraced the bee',” she breathed – and saw all the color drain
instantly from his horrified face.

“You were
there... in my dream,” Moira whispered.  Then her lips were tingling as she spat
the sudden realization – “No!  We were there, together, in
your
dream!”

If she had not
loved him before, what he did in the next moment sealed it completely.  Even
though he had obviously taken a terrible shock (the full implications of which
she was sure she didn't yet understand), he schooled his expression back into
calm implacability.  He glanced aside and checked himself in one of the
mirrors, making sure his demeanor and coloring had returned to normal.

If Moira had
not known better she would have thought him unaffected.

He stood and
took her free hand in his own, lifting her to her feet, putting her palm gently
but firmly in the crook of his elbow and escorting her to the door through a
weltering sea of female gaze – looking for all the world like a gentleman
taking his lady home after a fine meal and nothing else.

He didn't
storm from the cafe in disarray.  He didn't make her flounder along in his
wake, with both their expressions screaming to the watchers that something was
wrong.  He didn't cause a great scene or allow such drama to occur by his
neglect.  Not how Taylor would have done.

No, Leo
allowed her this graceful exit and enabled her to keep face.  The level of
consideration flooded her with gratitude.  He even made it all the way to the
car and opened her door chivalrously before walking around to his side.

As soon as he
sat down and fastened his seat belt, however, he closed his eyes and folded his
arms across his chest, withdrawing completely from the world.

We are
not
discussing this right now, his look said.

“You son of a
bitch,” she muttered, feeling the wild elation and excitement wringing itself
out of her veins, replaced with desolation and raw spikes of dismay. 

He loved her. 
He had to.  He told her so in their dream.  He had written her a sonnet – hell,
he
seduced
her with it.  And he had wanted her, just as she had wanted
him.  So what the fuck was the problem?

She put the
car in gear and maneuvered back out onto the roads; Leo never moved.

Moira drove
the hour home, feeling pain jangle across her nerves.  She let her mind be
blank.  Time enough to feel things when she was home and safe; focus on getting
there alive and without incident first.

He opened his
eyes when the wheels turned onto the dirt driveway, waiting only just long
enough for her to stop the car behind the house before he freed himself and
stood up out of the car, stripping off his shirt to let his wings out.

She stared at
him, jaw set.  “We have to talk – real talk – and soon, because I can't go on
this way.  I am losing my damn mind.”

Leo met her
gaze again and nodded once, slowly.  He led her inside, gestured for her to sit
at the kitchen table, silently retrieving her pill bottle and a new water
glass.  She took two while he opened her laptop bag and pulled out her legal
pad and a black Pilot pen.

He returned to
the table, spun the free chair around and sat on it backwards, letting his
wings drift behind him onto the faded floor.

Glancing over
at her he flipped to the first clean page of the pad, smoothed the others back
with his hand, clicked the pen and wrote:

~ So let us
talk. ~

He turned the
pad so she could see it.  His writing was crisp and precise, each letter sure
and separate, as if he'd learned to write in English from a twelfth century
monk.  His style fell somewhere between script and hieroglyphics.

“You never
told me you could write.”

~ You never
asked. ~

He showed her
the words.  She folded her arms over her chest, unamused.

~ I enjoyed
our interaction.  It seemed we understood each other well enough. ~

“Well that’s
where you’re wrong, because every single time I thought I'd gotten a grip on
your thoughts and intentions about this relationship – or whatever it is
between us – you've done something to spin me on my head all over again.”

~ Then talk to
me about it. ~

She scrubbed
fiercely at her eyes, letting her head rest for a moment in the shelter of her
hands.

“Sometimes
I've felt like you think of me as a pet, like a dog or a cat.  You love it and
you tolerate its odd little ways, but it's a completely different species. 
Lesser.”

~ That is not
so. ~

“Then what is
it?” she snarled.

He paused,
then wrote slowly and deliberately:  ~ I cherish and esteem you in my heart;
closer than I would a sister. ~

She flipped
the pad back to him.

“You don't
kiss me as if I were your sister.  You don't look at me or touch me as a
brother should – especially not in that dream.  This is what's got me so
fucking messed up.  What the hell do you want from me, Leo?”

He sighed
deeply and rolled his head back, stretching his neck.  He leaned forward again,
keeping his gaze on the page.

~ From before
the first moment I finally saw you with my eyes, when I lay at your feet
bloodied and broken, I had already loved you more than anyone or anything I'd
known in eons of existence. ~

She stared at
the page dully.  He took it back and wrote again.

~ I do not
know how or why. ~

“You don't
know why you love me?”

~ I do not
remember how it began, how I came to love you. ~

“Then how can
you know that you do?”

Leo gazed at
her a long moment.

~ A spring
rises up from the ground, clear and cold; no man can know its source from miles
away below the rock – but he trusts its clarity, and accepts its ability to
sustain him. ~

“Then why,”
she replied at last, “would you not be with me?  You had to know that I wanted
you; it's never been a secret.”

He wrote for a
long time, the pen scratching forcefully, then handed back the pad.  His eyes
were achingly sad.

~ I did not
want you to lay with me simply because I was here...

Because you
were desperate...

Because it had
been a while...

Because you
had nothing else...

Because I had
wings...

Because I was
tall...

Because I was
kind...

Because I was
magic...

If ever you
were with me, it must be only because you loved ME, to the heart and soul of
me.  It must be because you wanted me utterly, the same way I wanted you.

I can ask
nothing more... and my spirit can accept nothing less. ~

“You wanted
me,” she whispered.

~ I have never
stopped.  Out of your hundreds of questions, you never asked the one I dreaded:
why did I change out of my trousers that first night and into a new pair?  I
had only worn them a few hours.  Less than a day. ~

She read the
words, then raised her eyes to him.  He returned the look with perfect
frankness, although the blush lit his cheeks.

“You didn't...”

~ You went
into your room and shut the door.  After several hours I felt you fall asleep. 
I took the opportunity to deal with myself. ~

“But why, when
you knew I would have–”

He slashed his
free hand sternly, cutting her off.  He wrote again.

~ You have
heard of someone's destiny referred to as their 'doom'. ~

She nodded,
although it wasn't really a question.

~ To love you
is my doom, and I must bear it.  In solitude I can accept it.  But I cannot
dally with you and know that you do not feel the same.  I cannot sport with
you, thinking our time is transient in your mind.

I cannot lay
with you, with my heart so bound and yours completely free.  It will drive me
mad. ~

“And yet you
still touch me, and hold me, and let me touch you.”

~ I am an
angel, Moira – but I am also a man, of flesh and blood.  Not a statue. ~

She folded her
fingers around the edges of the pad.

“You love me,”
she said.  He did not nod, only allowed the perfect truth of it in his gaze.

“Then tell me.”

Leo reached as
if to take the paper but she moved it away.  “No–” she snapped, “–with your
voice!  Tell me what you need me to hear.”

His tongue
made an irritated circuit over his teeth and he held out his hand
peremptorily.  Finally, she surrendered the legal pad.

~ Have you
learned nothing from the death of the maggot that assaulted you?  The sound of
my voice can maim celestials and KILL mortals.  I do not yet have my full
memories and faculties returned – I cannot know with certainty that I would not
do the same to you.

~ Even
unintentionally. ~

“You chanted
something at him when you locked me out of the laundromat, specific words.”

~ It was a
healing cantrip to modulate the effect of my voice.  With it I specified a
duration of five diurnal cycles.  Had I not taken the care he would have
dropped dead at my feet.  I still do not know why he died in four, instead. 
This gives me cause to be even more cautious with your safety. ~

The look he
gave her was as serious as an aneurism.

“In the time I
have known you,” she answered slowly, “I have only ever feared you in one
instant – a fear that
you
provoked on purpose, to force me to release
the grief I held and allow my heart to begin to heal.

“In every
single other moment, I have felt nothing but safe with you.  Utterly secure;
beyond the realm of common sense, even.  I trust you with my body, my spirit,
my very life.”

She licked her
lips, apprehensive.

“Why can't you
trust yourself as I do?”

He wrote
again, slowly and distinctly.

~ Because I
can see the shadow of the life I lived before you, although I cannot yet make
out its details... and it is full of thousands of years and millions of deaths,
humans and celestials alike.  A never-ending ocean of blood.  Can you not
understand my fear? ~

Leo slid the
pad across to her.  His eyes were too bright; he turned his face away.

She slipped
the pen out of his grip and gave him her hand instead, tracing the scars up his
arm with her fingertips.

“This is not
all that you are.  You have made more than death.  Your hands are capable of
dealing tenderness and love – I’ve felt it.  In the week that you've been here,
you have improved everything that you've touched.  Even me.  You are a warrior.
 You are a weapon.  But that isn't all that you are.  Leo...”

She breathed
the word and gained clarity and understanding from it:  it wasn't his name, not
his true name.  It was what he let her call him, in the absence of his memory
of self.  He was almost as much a cipher to himself as he was to her.

“Two days
ago... I realized I was falling in love with you,” she said softly, taking the
plunge.  “I tried not to.  I told myself not to.  You'll remember everything
you are someday.  My fear is that those memories will force you to leave.  You
have had a life of whatever span – that did not include me.  Who knows if
you'll have a place for me in it, once you return?

“But I can't
stop, and I don't think I really want to, Leo.  Whatever the cost may be,
tomorrow or ten years from now.  You may not have your memories but the quality
– the caliber – of your soul will not change, and that is what I love.

“Return it to
me, darling.  Say it out loud.  Let me hear it, if only once.  Because if you
can't... I don't have all that much worth living for, otherwise.  I only
existed, before you were here.  I never knew why I kept on.

“Maybe there
was a reason.”

He slid out of
his chair onto his knees before her, reaching up to hold her face in his
palms.  A tear slipped out of each sky-blue eye; she stroked them away.

He truly
believes he's going to kill me, she thought; he believes I will hear his voice
and it will be the last thing I hear in this life.  He thinks his love is going
to murder me.

Moira felt no
fear – dying of love, quietly and quick, was far better than some of the
alternatives she'd seen.

Leo cleared
his throat.  He kept his eyes on hers as his lips parted, not willing to lose
an instant, should it be the last.

“I love you...
Moira Jerilyn Newton,” he breathed.

“There,” she
whispered after a moment.  “Was that so very hard?”

He nodded and
bent to rest his great shaggy head on her shoulder, silent tears soaking into
her shirt.

She ran her
hands through his hair, pulling out the tie-back to stroke it down over her
knuckles.  “Your voice is as low as I imagined it would be, but not rough. 
Just like in the dream.”

He chuckled
quietly, wrapping his arms around her.  “You have yet to hear it on the
battlefield.”

“Or in the
bed,” she mentioned.

He pulled back
enough to look up at her with some surprise.  She met his study directly,
challenging him without words.

“I have
something I wish to share with you,” Leo began.

Her eyes grew
heavy-lidded with delight.

“Not like
that,” he cautioned.  “At least... not yet.  Come with me.”

He led her by
the hand loosely, into the living room and down into their shared bed-nest. 
She dropped her boots and socks onto the carpet before stretching out by his
side.

“Among angels,
we believe that thoughts are personal and belong to the individual,” he
explained, caressing her face.  “One's feelings, however, can affect the
performance of the unit and as such belong to all.  Emotions can be a source of
comfort, a bonding, or a weapon.

“I am a
general.  That much I can remember.  As such, my empathy is at the strongest
level in record.  I can stop a mob in full cry.  I can project emotions to
soothe or to drive... and I can pierce into another's heart and discern their
emotional state and health, against their will if need be.