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After s
ucking in a ragged breath I squeezed my eyes shut, afraid of the emotions stirring in my chest. I didn’t want to feel again. Being numb to love and desire had once been a part of my curse. In recent times, it was the only reason I continued to follow the call wherever it would take me. Feelings might have been my downfall, but I had forgotten how delicious they could be until I felt the new couple. Their emotions were tied to me, to help me aid or test them as I saw fit. But it was addictive, feeding off human emotions. Days ago as I had left my latest assignment, safe in the beach home with images of their future flashing rapidly in my head, I had ached for things I could never have.

The general a
pathy I existed constantly within was a gift compared to the way I felt when I was with Cain. He left me feeling unhinged and transfixed on a compulsion to seek more of that lovely feeling.

Is
this how I made Seid feel?
My innards twisted at the thought. One thing I knew for certain. If I didn’t leave tonight, I would damn us all to whatever punishment Seid determined.

So I willed the
curse to fill and encompass me and relinquished the things that made me feel human. Lissa and Cain’s connection had diminished into a faint golden thread now, ready to break and snap with decay. I cringed as I reached up a finger to test its strength. The last time I was sent to salvage such a connection as this, it snapped before my eyes, the first evening I observed them together. Yet I had felt the pull and draw of Cain and Lissa so strongly, I practically flew across the country. How could it have reduced so quickly to this?

I wanted to shout at Seid, then, to beat his chest with my fists for wasting my time.
Anger was an emotion I was much more acquainted with, so I soaked it up like a sponge, snatched hold of the thread connecting Cain with Lissa and let it carry me.

The floor buckled beneath my feet and then simply was not there anymore. Homes and
the people safely inside them blurred past me, the homeless having vacated the streets for their shelters. While the city slept beneath a layer of ice I let the hum of their emotions fill until it choked me.

Soon I wouldn’t feel so human anymore and could forget this weakness.

In spite of the cruel winter scene a few lone stragglers haunted the alleyways, shooting up, chugging alcohol and walking off the buzz that made them immune to the cold.

Isn’t that what you’re doing? Drowning in the
ir emotions so you can forget?

City lights blurred behind the watery layer of tears filling my eyes and I wiped them furiously away. Once I was like them, naïve enough to believe in third, fifth and seventh chances. I flirted with my death like an old lover.

Had I known the true face hidden behind Seid’s charm, I would have listened to my sister’s warnings. Though they never saw him they did see me, after the hours I spent lost in the contours of his body. Every time I returned from our hideaway beneath the sea I lost pieces of myself. But I had been beaten by my husband, the man Father bound me to. My time with Seid was meant to be brief, one last dalliance before duty. But with every passing moon my hatred for Father’s choice grew. My sisters noticed first. I should have kept my mouth shut. Maybe then they wouldn’t have betrayed my secrets to my husband’s servants. Maybe then Seid would have stayed his fury.

Lissa was on the other side of the city,
lost in the sleekest of neighborhoods I saw replicated in every city. Every metropolis needed a center where power players could stake their claim. As I flew above the hard ground I remembered the limo Lissa and her gentleman friend escaped in and I wasn’t surprised the thread had led me here.

What did surprise me was how empty many of the
widely spaced homes felt. Here were the grand palaces and the modern-day royalty. And I knew firsthand how few with grand wealth managed to remain free of corruption.

Lissa’s flame of the moment had
brought her to his personal palace at the very top of an exclusive hotel suite. After passing through the outer walls, I breathed in the scent of wealth and glanced up through the ceiling. It was so different from Cain’s apartment, far more richly furnished but somehow colder.

Stop thinking about what does not belong to you!

Clenching my fists
tightly, I returned my focus to the fragile cord and lifted my hand towards it. Weak though it might be, the connection between Lissa and Cain was strong enough that I was lifted up. My body felt weightless as it passed through every obstacle, so easily I could almost begin to forget what it meant to be in Cain’s grounding presence.

When I opened my eyes again I was standing on a solid floor. Instantly
my body solidified and sought to acclimate to my new surroundings. All light was dimmed or snuffed completely, though I took in the thoughtless perfection of the apartment in one fell sweep. The rest of the flat was immaculate, with wide curtain-masked windows overlooking the skyscrapers, furnished with the latest in exclusive tastes.

Overall this storm should have given her ample time to make the ideal conquest. She had been his woman of choice to wait out the deepening freeze
with. But the trail I had followed still linked she and Cain together. No matter what she and this other man shared, a shard of her heart belonged to Cain.

Sounds
were coming from the bedroom and I instinctively moved toward it. Clothes were strewn about the floor of the tiled hallway. Lissa’s shawl, coat and pumps had been carelessly tossed aside with his tie and polished black shoes.

Have they left the bed at all?
I thought with a twist of my lips. Two dirty plates and a half-finished bottle of wine sat atop the bar. A brief light pant echoed through the nearby wall and caught my immediate attention. Stepping through the solid matter, I pushed easily through and stood amid the shadows of Derek’s bedroom. His bed seemed to take up a solid corner of space and here he lay sprawled on his stomach across it in a dreamless sleep. Following the outline of his body clearly revealed the appeal he must have for any woman. But there was something lacking from him that I had not felt the other night.

Where is Lissa?

The panting began afresh, this time coming from behind the bathroom door. A faint light escaped the frame and I couldn’t shake the foreboding in my heart as I approached it.

The instant I stepped foot through the door I was met by the stench of blood and
the jarring sight of my reflection. Hidden from her eyes I might be, but I cleft to the shadows and avoided the light, because I was afraid of my own reflection.

Lissa’s
glorious unbound hair that I had admired under the night lights was gathered loosely in a band behind her head. Her honey-brown skin looked too pale and drawn against her gaunt frame. With her hands braced on the sink counter she lifted her head and stared at her reflection. Her leaf-green eyes were red with tears.

I wondered
briefly if she could see me as Cain had, watching over her shoulder from the darkness like a specter.

How fitting…

I was a creature of the darkness now, trapped by my own selfish desires. Clearly something was horribly wrong. Her aura was broken, torn nearly to shreds in that moment. How to explain an aura to human eyes? It was like the swirling of every feeling or emotion you had or would soon have, color-coded. Sometimes it sprang from their skins like a divine halo, while others it hung over like a bleak cloud, or smoldered on their features in a thick gray fog. Most often it appeared like the northern lights, a shimmering of color so rich it was impossible to name them all. I had seen every color, naked or invisible to the human eye.

Lissa’s came off her in red steam and matched
the blood staining her lips and spattered on her upturned palms.

Clenching my teeth against the harsh metallic scent, I
focused on her scantily clad form. The lingerie looked uncomfortable and the constrained cut didn’t seem to fit with the vivacious young woman I saw on the dance floor.

Despair poured from her
glassy eyes as she breathed steadily in and out. With shaking hands she held up the palm full of dripping blood and a hoarse wail broke past her lips. She twisted the sink knob quickly, then ran her hands under the stream of water until it steamed and nearly scalded her skin.

“Pull it together
, chica,” she whispered to herself as she grabbed a soap bar and scrubbed between her fingers vigorously. As she leaned into the overhead light I saw the bruises imprinted down her back, the marks where his hands had been.

A flash of images darted through my mind of Derek throwing her onto the bed and gripping onto her until she screamed, not from ecstasy but agony. I could feel Lissa’s pleasure quickly turning to fear
and then pain. Pressure filled my ears until all sound was blocked out, save for a dull ringing. The air I breathed seemed to stifle and thicken until I was clutching my throat and clinging to the curse to keep me hidden. The images called forth unbidden plunged me into emotions I never wanted to relive again. Yet in the darkness behind my eyelids I could still see, smell and feel everything so clearly.

“No! Stop, please! I promise to obey!” I cowered, scrambling backwards with my hands on my already broken body. The whip in his hands hung limp and stained by my blood at his side. His chest heaved with the aftermath of his former rage.

“You
certainly shall obey, Orona. I will not stand sharing my possessions with anyone else. Our union is little more than a business deal, but your father and I signed a contract binding you to me. Do you know what it says of my rights in the case of your infidelity?” His dark eyes blackened to pitch as he took another step and loomed over me.

I shivered, nodding. “I understand. I will obey.”

~

I ran to the cliffs as soon as I was able
to escape the eyes of his guard, though the scabs from my wounds were barely healed. Every breath I took was agony and every sob jarred the ragged skin of my back.

“Seid!” I gasped and fell
at his feet. Had he not caught me I would have planted into the earth. At the simple touch I felt relief and the full weight of what I had endured settle in.

Today his skin was dark as the clouds looming over us, his eyes swirling with tempests.
“Orona, I could feel your pain! Who would dare to touch you like this?” Thunder rumbled in the billowing skies, tail-ending his words.

“It was him. His slave followed me
here the day before. He saw us together.” I shook, already seeing double. My wounds were opening and my lover cursing violently as the lightning that parted the seas.

The sound of Lissa’s cries brought me back to the present as she crooned over herself. “It’s okay… we’re going to be okay, baby girl… we’re going to be okay.” Lissa had crumpled onto the floor with her face between her raw hands. Silent sobs shook her, breaking up her prayers as she rocked against the wall.

Slowly I turned to meet my reflection
and looked into the eyes of the creature I had become. The clashing colors trapped within those familiar pupils were stained by a fresh wave of tears. The creature in the mirror gaped and slowly lifted her fingers to wipe them away. For two thousand years I had allowed myself to accept Seid’s curse, to become soulless. But once I was vulnerable and human, weak as this woman unaware of my vigil. Guilt was a feeling I hadn’t allowed myself in ages for I had every right to place the blame on Seid
.

Selfishly I had appeased the curse but
my task had long lost its luster. Perhaps this was why so many marriages, relationships, and first loves had failed, in spite of my efforts?

Because I did not want them to. Because I ha
ve given up.

I could no longer pretend this was about my unjust punishment. I had not even been visited by Seid in
a thousand years and was sure he had found another woman to seduce.

But once I had been
like this broken woman and even if my happy ending never came, I wanted this for Lissa and Cain, more than I wanted anything.

-lisa

Chapter 8

Dangerously Beautiful

As Cain slept in the next morning I explored his home, the visit to Lissa and Derek fresh on my conscience. My mission had changed overnight, infused with new vigor. I would do anything to renew the link between my couple. But first I needed to know them better. To begin, I needed to find what it was that linked them together in the first place.

A small closet
stood next to the door of his room, facing the kitchen bar. Little in his apartment reflected Cain’s personality, only the outer shell. To know him I must dig deeper than I had ever cared to before. Had I been human I might have never found the courage to pry into another person’s belongings. Then again I might have anyway. A selfish, darker part of me warred against duty, wanted to know why he had picked
her
.

So I turned the knob slowly and pulled the closet door open to peek inside.
In the dusty darkness I breathed in the scent of the salty sea, mixed with a lingering old spice. My father made his living trading in spices and other expensive wares. Once, I knew every one of their scents by heart. This one was different, almost older. I could not remember the name.