Starcrossed (44 page)

had an emotional block against using her bolts she was learning

how to control them and let them out bit by bit. Only someone who

didn’t mind getting fried could fight her hand to hand. Now,

coupled with the power of the cestus, which made her impervious

to any weapon, Helen had become nearly undefeatable.

Toward the end of their session that day Hector tried to put her

in a Kimura and she electrocuted him for the third time. He

dropped unconscious to the mat. After a moment, she approached

him and nudged him with her toe.

“Are we done here?” she asked him with raised eyebrows when

he came around.

“You still don’t know how to fight,” he mumbled as he wiped

blood off of his lips.

“You bit through your tongue,” Helen said flatly. “You should

probably take a break.”

Helen went to her corner to drink some water. She saw Claire,

Jason, Cassandra, and Ariadne all staring at her from outside the

fight cage. Jason was the first to move. He took two long strides,

jumped fluidly over the metal fence, and landed next to his shaking

brother.

“I think that’s enough, Hector,” Jason said. “She doesn’t need any

more training.”

“She can’t even throw a punch!” Hector protested, slurring his

words.

“She doesn’t need to,” Cassandra said with finality. “She doesn’t

need to learn to punch or hold a sword or shoot an arrow to defend

306/395

herself. She’s already ten times more lethal than you are, Hector,

and if you keep trying to find a way to beat her you’re going to end

up brain dead. These sessions are over.”

Cassandra stood up and walked out of the dojo.

“She’s still vulnerable!” Hector shouted after Cassandra’s retreating

figure. “There are a million ways to subdue her once you find a

way to get around her bolts!”

“Enough, Hector,” Jason said gently. “Cassandra’s right. Figure

out her vulnerabilities and train her to deal with them, but the dojo

work is done. Hand-to-hand combat is not something she ever has

to fear.”

“So no more chaperone?” Helen asked, raising her eyes from her

empty water bottle. The Delos kids looked at each other,

shrugging.

“I guess not,” Hector finally concluded. “At least not until Cassandra

foresees a threat. Then, I don’t care how lethal you are, one

of us will be with you at all times again.”

“May I go until then?” Helen asked, looking at Hector and waiting

politely for permission. He nodded. She bowed to him and then

jumped into the air.

“Wait, Lennie!” Claire shouted up at her. “We were going to

throw you a party. Kate made you a cake!”

Helen saw Claire, saw how worried she was, but she couldn’t do

what Claire wanted. She couldn’t pretend to be cheerful. Not for a

few hours while everyone threw her a party, not for half an hour to

let them at least sing “Happy Birthday” and scarf down some cake,

and not even for the five minutes it would take to explain to Claire

why she couldn’t do any of those things.

“Love you,” she called out to her best friend before she flew away.

She thought she heard Jason say something like “Lucas is the

same” while she pulled open the door and soared out, but she

might have imagined it.

307/395

She didn’t have a destination or a time limit—she only knew that

she wasn’t allowed off island. She’d given Lucas her word, and she

wasn’t about to break it now. Helen needed so desperately for their

promises to be true, she wasn’t willing to break any of them—not

even the one that might bring her some comfort. She might never

get to go to Patagonia with Lucas, but the least she could do to

keep faith between them was to not fly over the ocean until he told

her it was okay.

She could, however, go right to the edge. She’d avoided Great

Point for the past week—not because she was worried she’d break

down and cry if she went there, but because she was worried she

wouldn’t. She was starting to get frightened that she would never

going to feel anything again. That she would become as sterile and

lifeless as one of those pale flowers she saw in her nighttime wandering.

She had enough sense to ask herself why she was reacting

the way she was, but not enough clarity to discover the answer.

Until she saw Lucas sitting on top of the lighthouse.

He was perched right on the edge of the catwalk that wrapped

around the glass dome at the top of the lighthouse, watching the

last bit of the day drag itself down behind the horizon. A storm was

gathering over the water, and the fruit-punch colors of the sunset

seemed to be trying to claw their way out of the rain clouds. His

skin was painted with that dying light and he was, as always,

beautiful.

Then Helen understood why she was pent up like a dam instead

of bawling like a waterfall. She wasn’t sad. She was furious.

As she flew toward him, he saw her and stood. Helen didn’t land

on the catwalk. Instead, she floated in front of him, claiming the

air for herself. For a moment, they just stared at each other, both of

them too overwhelmed to break the silence with speech.

“What are you doing here?” Lucas said at last, his sunken eyes

wide and hungry for the sight of her. Helen ignored his stupid

question and said the first thing that came to mind.

308/395

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she demanded, angry and hurt and not

sure what she wanted to hear from him. “Right from the start. Why

couldn’t you at least explain to me why we couldn’t be together?”

“If you wanted to know, why didn’t you just answer the phone

one of the thousand times I’ve called you this past week?” he demanded

in return, just as angry and hurt as she was.

“Stop it! Stop asking me questions when you’re the one with all

the answers!” she bellowed at him, finally feeling the hitch and

sting of tears in her throat.

The dam was about to burst, and she knew that what was going

to come out would be ugly, red-faced sobbing. She had to get as far

away from Lucas as possible. She summoned one of the turbulent

storm winds to yank her body away and take her wherever it chose,

but Lucas felt her recklessness. He dove into the air and caught her

before she could be chewed up by the storm she was so drastically

underestimating. As soon as he had her safe again in his arms he

broke down and kissed her.

Helen was so stunned she stopped crying before she had a chance

to start and nearly fell out of the sky. Still the better flyer, Lucas

caught her and supported her as they tumbled on the wind, holding

and kissing each other as he guided them safely back down to

the catwalk. As their feet touched down, the light inside the lighthouse

switched on and projected the shadows of their embracing

figures out onto the choppy waves of the ocean.

“I can’t lose you,” Lucas said, pulling his mouth away from hers.

“That’s why I didn’t tell you the whole truth. I thought if you knew

how bad it was you’d send me away. I didn’t want you to give up

hope. I can’t do this if you give up on us.”

“I don’t want to give up,” Helen cried. “But there can never be an

us, Lucas. You should have told me that.”

“Don’t say never,” he said. He brushed his face against her neck,

no longer kissing her, but unable to let her go completely. “Nothing

is forever, and there are no absolutes. We’ll find a way.”

309/395

“Lucas,” Helen said, frowning and pushing against his chest until

he let her go. She sat down on the catwalk and pulled him down

next to her so they could talk. “We would hate ourselves. And eventually,

we’d hate each other.”

“I know that!” he said, his voice rising desperately. “I’m not talking

about running off and doing whatever we want!”

“Then, what?” Helen asked softly, calming him down. “What are

we supposed to do?”

“I don’t know yet,” he admitted. He leaned back against the glass

wall of the lighthouse and pulled Helen against his chest. “But I

will not go through another week like this last one.”

“Me neither,” she said. She rested against him, fully relaxing for

the first time in days. “I don’t care how hard being together is,

nothing is worse than being apart.”

“What was it you told me? Decide what you can’t do and then do

the opposite?” he asked with an amused smile, pressing his lips

against her forehead. “At least now we know we can’t be apart.”

“It was like being dead,” she said fearfully, as if even mentioning

the numbness she had felt would allow it to creep back into her

body.

“For me too,” he said in a strange, strangled voice.

“What about your mother? She won’t allow us to be together.”

“We’ll have to talk with her. We’ll have to talk to my whole

family.”

“And if they still want to separate us?”

“Then we run,” Lucas said, his voice low and even.

Neither of them said anything for a while. They just watched the

beacon light flash across the foaming waves of the storm-churned

ocean. Helen could hear his heart pounding, but his grip on her

only tightened as if he was already bracing himself for the battle he

would have to fight to keep her close to him.

“They’ll chase us,” she whispered. “They’ll think we’ve started the

war.”

310/395

“I know,” Lucas said. “But we won’t. We’ll keep the Truce, even if

they don’t believe that we can.”

“We don’t have to make the same mistakes that they did,” Helen

said defiantly. “It makes me so angry that everyone assumes that

even though we know what would happen, we’ll still go out and do

the same stupid thing.”

Lucas laughed, but there was no joy in the sound.

“It’s almost as if we don’t need to live our lives or feel our feelings

at all, because someone already told us what the ending was going

to be,” he said bitterly. She could feel him tensing with indignation,

until a new and serious thought stilled him. “Are you really willing

to do this? You know that it would mean you’d have to leave your

father behind?”

“I know,” she said, knowing full well she’d be hurting her father

far worse than her mother ever did, but also knowing that she

would do it for Lucas—for both of them.

“I understand if you can’t do this—” he began, but Helen cut him

off.

“If they won’t let us stay together, we have no choice. We have to

run away.”

“It won’t be forever,” he said, trying to console her as well as himself.

“Just until we can figure out a way around this. And we will

figure it out. There has to be a way.”

“I’ve thought of something,” Helen said, her whole body going

still. She felt Lucas tense.

“I think I know where you’re going with this, and I don’t think I

want to hear you say it,” he said uncertainly.

“What if I wasn’t a virgin?” Helen said quickly, just to get it over

with.

“I’m not sharing you, Helen,” he replied immediately. “Besides, it

won’t work.”

“I’m serious, we have to consider it,” she insisted, struggling in

his arms until he loosened his grip enough for her to lean back and

311/395

look at him. “Tell me the truth. Would you stop wanting me if I was

with someone else first?”

“Of course not,” he said, smiling tenderly at her. “And I don’t just

want you, Helen. I love you. Big difference.”

“Okay, look. I hate to even think about this, but I’ll do it,” Helen

pleaded as Lucas started to shake his head vehemently. “I love you,

too, and I’ll do whatever I have to do if it will let us be together.

What? Why are you shaking your head? You’re not the only one

making this decision, you know.”

“Tricks like that won’t work, not unless you just want something

physical. Is that all you want from me? Sex?” he teased.

“Of course not, you know that!” Helen said in frustration, shoving

him away from her. “I just told you I loved you!”

“That’s why it won’t work,” he said. He took her hands and pulled

her closer to him. “If you and I were to be together the way we

want, or at least the way I want—” he began uncertainly.

“And what do you want, exactly?” Helen interrupted urgently.

“I want it all. Everything we talked about. I want us to go to

school, learn a dozen languages, live all over the world. Most of all,

I want us to be together.”

“I do, too!” Helen said excitedly as if she had found a way out.

“And we can do all that without ever getting married!”

“We’d share everything,” he said, shaking his head like Helen

wasn’t understanding him. “And because of that, we’d be considered

a married couple in the eyes of the gods, regardless of who

took your virginity. I want a whole life with you, and because I

want that, you would be my wife. I can’t even pretend I would

settle for less.”

“You’re saying that it’s our commitment to each other that will

define us to the gods, not a white dress or a ring?” Helen asked,

already knowing the answer.

“Exactly,” he said. Then he suddenly laughed at a thought. “Also,

it’d be kinda hard to be together if I was in prison.”