by Inez Kelley
Chapter Fourteen
Around Salome, the air swam with bodies and debris but calm existed in the eye of her tornado. Beneath her, his copper hair didn’t even flutter. Bryton frowned. He could see Salome, shaking with magnificent anger, and himself, busted and battered. He reached for her but his hand passed through her arm. What was going on? Was he dead? He stared at his hands and his frown deepened. No pale purple glow. On the altar, his chest moved with a slow, weak struggle. Not dead yet.
“I’ve missed you.”
A soft-spoken alto yanked his head up and he spun. Katina stood before him in all her ghostly splendor, radiance shining in soft lavender beams. The cut of her jaw, the arch of her brow, the curve of her lip, all were achingly familiar to him. He’d basked in the same features every night since meeting her. Not fully solid, her violet-limned spirit let him see through her but he couldn’t take his gaze from her luminous face. A gentle tilt of her head rushed his soul with devotion. He loved her so. Love burst inside his chest, its heat a welcome flame. A sob caught and lodged in his throat.
He reached for her and she stepped back.
“Not yet. You haven’t yet crossed. Something holds you here.”
Bryton glanced at Salome, her outpoured misery stemming from shattered love, and his heart ached. He turned back to Katina, confusion and guilt sinking to a hard knot in his gut.
“The love you have for her gives you the power to fight death.” Katina’s voice tightened the knot.
“I love you,” he protested.
A laugh like church bells rang in his ears. “I know that, silly. Do you think I can’t watch you and Jana?”
Though he knew he had no earthly body, a hot flush formed on his cheeks. The laughter came again. Her blue-green eyes sparkled in a tease and she arched one golden eyebrow. “Yes, I know about the barmaids…and the whiskey. You need your ass kicked for that last bottle.”
Joy burst from him. This was really his Katina, in all her spunkiness. She used to look at him the same way when he tracked boot mud through their chambers. Shit, he missed her. He wanted to hold her and never let her go. But she’d stepped away from him.
“What’s happening, Kat?”
“You have a choice to make.” Her skirt did not move with her step but she was suddenly before him, inches from his chest, the scent of peaches tickling his nose. Greedily, he sucked in the fragrance, pressing it to his heart.
Fear tightened his mouth. She was going to say he had to choose her or Salome. His mother had once torn his favorite outgrown tunic down the center to make a quilt. The ripping noise had quivered his childish lip. That same sound echoed in his ears now. His mouth opened but he didn’t know how to answer the unspoken challenge.
“Bryton, stop.” Katina shook her head. “Love is never a choice. It’s a blessing you can accept or deny. I’m so glad you accepted Salome’s love. Your torment broke my heart. You did nothing wrong, my dearest. And you’ll never have to choose between Salome and me. We both love you.” Her hand rose and reached toward his hair. He felt a touch, like a breath, stir the black. “You must say goodbye to me and allow your heart to love completely.”
“And if I don’t?” His eyes closed and he swallowed a lump of heartache. “I can’t lose you again.”
A smack hit his arm, the same fisted punch he’d felt for nearly three summers of courtship and marriage whenever she was exasperated with him. His eyes popped open to see her smile. He reached to rub his sore biceps. How could she hit him if he couldn’t touch her? That seemed so unfair.
“You’re a thick-skulled jackass. You’ll never lose me. I live in your heart and through our daughter. If you cannot let go of the past, you can never move forward, on either side of life. You will drift without anchor and be alone for eternity.”
Those words boomed deep in his soul with a truthful resonance he could not deny. Hadn’t he thought of himself as a walking dead man? Now he was no different, not dead, not alive, but alone. He had no human body. He had no lavender light streaming from his spirit. He couldn’t touch Katina or Salome. He was nothing, trapped between worlds and would remain like this forever, cut off from those he loved.
Katina pointed to the bleeding shell on the altar. “This was not your destiny. You knew your path but allowed grief to guide you. It trapped you in misery as surely as iron chains. Let go of what was and live as you were intended to live.”
“Living without you hurts, Kat.”
“I’m here, my dearest. I’ll never leave you but you hold me away. You don’t think with joy and happiness on what we shared. You remember only the pain, the fear. The heart is a gateway. Stop barring me. Feel my love, my memory. Allow Salome to lead you to full peace.”
Salome had said the same thing to him. He pictured his heart as a garden gate, the mechanisms stiff from disuse, and pushed at it. It creaked open, rusty hinges squeaking in protest. He braced for the flood of pain and the anguished brush of loss. It never came. Images whispered on a gentle breeze, more bittersweet than searing—Katina laughing in the dance hall, her smile when he proposed, the tears after their first fight, the wonder when Jana was born. Tender ache wrapped each picture in the blush of remembered love.
“Death cannot part those who love. Only fear and hate can do that. Let me go now, Bryton, and fight for your life.” Katina’s whisper husked with pleading, with longing. “Live, love and I’ll be here when you’re an old man and pass in your bed, with your children and grandchildren at your feet.”
Peace wafted on the breeze, peaches tinged with honey. Love welled and brimmed over, spilling a serene glow through his soul. He hadn’t lost Katina. She waited. She’d always be with him and now, one day, he’d hold her again.
“Goodbye, my love. I’ll never forget again.”
He cupped Katina’s cheeks. It was like touching smoke, wispy fluff with no solid form. Softer than starlight, her ethereal skin warmed his palms and he pressed a gentle kiss to her mouth. Sugared wine flowed on lips in perfect tune, then she stepped back, out of his arms. Her eyes were no longer wet with fear but with never-ending love.
Her face shone with her wide smile. “Your destiny awaits.”
Bryton looked at his body, the shuddering chest trying to draw air, the pools of blood beneath the altar. The remembered torture made his throat clench and his stomach revolt. “Destiny is going to have to wait a while. Injuries like that take a long time to heal, if they ever do. I won’t be a captain or a soldier anymore.”
One delicate brow dipped in consternation and her mouth quirked high on one side in dismay. Suddenly her chin lifted as if she were listening to a song. A mischievous glint burst like gold in her eyes. “Never doubt magic, husband of my heart.”
“Good morrow, Bryton, guardian of my dearest blood.”
Bryton whirled at the lilting tone and sucked in a gasp. Haloed in lavender, the late Queen Tarsha’s mystic eyes glimmered in brilliant deep green. He’d only seen her once, on an evil-shaded rooftop where magic—her magic—changed history and love defied death. He’d never heard her speak. Perhaps this middle ground, straddled between the living and the dead, let her words flow to his ears. The gentle inflection of string instruments blended with her voice to rise in a charmed symphony. Power vibrated from her spectral image in waves of sun-kissed warmth. A stirring under his rib cage grew as his gifted enchantment recognized her might. It thudded with the force of a hundred cannons.
Duty, training and tribute dropped him to his knee and bowed his head. Sincere reverence and respect lowered his voice. “My queen.”
Her otherworldly fingers, so soft, like the kiss of snow on his skin, stroked his cheek, cupped his jaw and lifted his chin. He got caught in her incandescent gaze. More than magic pulled at him. Her sunshine hair streamed with ghostly wind and her gown fluttered in the veil of the supernatural, but all he could see were her eyes. Deep evergreen with the glow of power, the strength of royalty, the light of maternal protection, they reached into him and read his soul.
Affection he had not earned colored her words. “How deeply your valor runs. Once you chose your pathway and vowed to guard my son. I ask you now, do you hold to that promise?”
“I do. By my blood and my honor, I reaffirm my oath to the House of Segur.”
“A test of that oath will tax your very soul. Are you strong enough to confront your deepest fear?”
Bryton frowned. What did she mean? He’d lived through seasons of bloody battles, losing his wife, and the Skullmen’s torture. What hardship could surpass any of those? There were none. He’d faced hell already. He nodded. An odd, icy tingle tremored in the base of his neck. His gifted foreshadowed knowledge shuddered, but here in this bridging realm, it had no strength.
Before he could question it, verdant lights flashed in her gaze. “My magic has limits set by nature. I cannot replace what was taken but I can heal what was broken. Return and know this—only love can give life but there is power in a kiss.”
She pressed a butterfly-light kiss to his forehead.
Bryton slammed into awareness with a hard jolt. A sudden harsh breath filled his lungs with cool, dry air. He used his tongue to check but all his teeth were whole. His eyes snapped open but only one worked. He touched his face with trembling fingers. His left eye was gone but the flesh around it was unscarred.
Momentary panic flooded him but he swallowed it down. Losing an eye was a pittance if it freed his homeland. He was alive, warm, vital blood pumping strongly in his veins—it was enough. Cautiously he sat up, the stone altar hard under his ass. Both legs felt and moved. He ached, but not like before. It was more like stiffness, as if he’d been lying on a slab of stone.
He lifted his head and drank in Salome’s glory, her power. A hearty chuckle filled him. He’d been sent back to her. Now he just had to tame a tornado to claim her.
Before he could climb from the altar, movement pulled his attention behind Salome. Chakor was crawling toward her, fighting the wind low to the ground as dirt and dust swirled around him. A lethal curved dagger was clenched between his teeth. Each heartbeat of time, he drew closer and closer to Salome’s back.
Bryton had no sword, no axe, no daggers tucked away, but he didn’t think, he reacted. Armed only with love and muscle, he leaped from the altar and threw himself at Chakor. He hit the Skullman with the strength of a charging bull, knocking the sword away. The impact forced them into a roll, each struggling for dominance. Wind lashed at his skin, turned his hair into stinging whips, and blew dust into his one remaining eye but Bryton never let go.
“Should’ve killed me when you had the chance, fuckwit,” Bryton snarled.
Chakor spat in his face then jammed the heel of his hand up against Bryton’s chin. The strike knocked his head back and the tang of blood once more filled his mouth. He forced his thumb farther under Chakor’s upper lip, between the flesh and the gum line, far away from those yellowed teeth. A vicious thrust sent his thumb through the tender membranes. Skin tore and Chakor screamed.
Bryton flipped him over, planting a knee solidly in his lower back and wrapping one large hand around his chin. A quick twist and Chakor’s body slumped to the ground. Bryton made sure there was no pulse before he relaxed his frame, rolling the dead Skullman over. A sardonic snort flew from his lips and he gripped Chakor’s leather eye patch. The dead man had no more use for it but he did.
He quickly knotted the thin tie around his head, and situated the hard leather over his sightless eye. “If I get a rash from this thing, I’m coming back and pissing on your bones.”
“You made one hell of a mess, birdie.”
A deep chuckle crashed into her essence and she whipped around, dropping her hands. The wind whistled as it slowed and her lips parted. Bryton smiled at her, a mischievous dimple carving his face. He wore an eye patch over his left eye but the right glistened with devilry, with life. The dirge in her soul careened to a halt and a crescendo of love blasted the stone.
“Bryton!” She leaped and hard-muscled arms circled around her. His hand sank into her hair, pressing her tighter to him. A furious galloping heart thumped under her ribs. It beat next to his, strong and steady. “How?”
His arms loosened a fraction and he smiled. “I opened the gate. Katina helped. Then I met a queen who…Yeah, let’s just call it magic, okay?”
She stroked his cheek, lightly touching the patch over his eye. He shrugged. “Magic can’t fix everything but it’s all right. I got to hold you again.”
Words jumbled in her mind but none could spill from her lips. They were too busy dancing with his to speak. She buried her fingers in his hair, bringing his mouth to hers. Just his breath mingling with hers, the glide of his lips, the stroke of his tongue, calmed her. Holding him, she basked in his life essence singing to her. He kissed her until she grew dizzy, breathless with unimagined happiness.
The call to return to her realm pulled harder at her essence. She squinted, blocking the lure, pleading for more time, time with him. The summons did not decrease. Fear took root. Salome pressed her mouth firmer to his, deepened the kiss, tried to make his taste part of her soul. Magic hands tugged at her and regret cracked with the force of a whip. She didn’t want to leave him.
Parting from him, even knowing he had healed and she’d been part of that, came too soon. Her fingers did not want to release him and she had to forcibly pry her hold from his shoulders. Stepping from him cramped her belly and winced her heart. A sad note chimed in her breast. They were so evenly matched it seemed fated but could not be.
A questioning look furrowed his brow as she pulled from his embrace. Her gaze traced his face, the breadth of his shoulders, the plane of his chest. Every nuance she clutched close to her heart. She didn’t want to leave a single thing unmemorized, not the slope of his nose, not the arrogance of his brow, not the curve of his hip.
How magnificently proud he stood. Authority and self-confidence radiated from every pore. His aura was lighter, brighter than she had ever seen it. It glowed a healthy green with the sparkled highlights of love. The last beats of her human heart carried the song of breaking dreams and shattered wishes.
“Be at peace, my beloved. I shall always love you.”
Lilac smoke swirled around her. The shock on his face blurred beneath her tears as her essence succumbed to the harmonies of her home realm. Liquid vibrations of music and light converged in her spirit, tingling her human marrow, slowing her pulse. Tears slipped down cheeks fading to nothing. A sweet fragrance wrapped around her, an orchard at full peak, full of blooms and sun-ripened fruit. Through a waterfall of the palest violet, Bryton’s fierce stare locked with hers. Waves of stunned misery poured from him. His aura shone a blinding pink—love.
Unseen hands cradled her, lifting her into another time and space. First, she lost the sense of smell, the rich minerals of blood and stone fading away. Touch numbed until her skin didn’t feel the silken brush of her gown, her arms losing the sun’s warmth. Vision grew hazy and hearing dimmed to everything but the melody of magic and the sorrow in her soul. Not even the powers of color and light could strip her love away and it remained. A weeping bittersweetness filled her.
A trumpet blasted and she shivered. She used every droplet of strength to remain one more moment, to fill her fading human eyes with his face. Her temporal heart couldn’t let go. One rush of power careened with a high soprano. It held for a full measure in a piercing sharp, cutting through her soul like a fine-honed knife. Salome fought the call. Muscle and bone vibrated at different resonances. They twanged with opposing force and jarring pain. A concerto of mystic song swelled. Like the tiny bee feet and wings, purple illuminated lights crawled along her body. This time it stung—a million minute pricks in one breath.
The symphony of her world was so strong, movement barely penetrated the melody. She squinted in confusion. Golden skin streaked with dirt-caked blood, Karok sprang like a rabbit from a snare. Salome gasped as he tackled Bryton from behind. The billowing cloud of pale dust obs
cured them but the sounds of grappling tore at her belly. Terror shocked through her with a blue-white crack. The fog settled and that terror skyrocketed.
Karok, blood-smeared, liquid murder shining from his topaz eyes, sprayed red spittle from his twisted mouth. Straddling Bryton’s waist, he jammed Bryton’s own axe handle across his throat. Brilliant blue blazed from Bryton’s eye. Back arched and pain lining his face, he clawed at Karok but jerked his hands away as if scalded. Salome’s horror grew with the realization that the warded-magic touch of Karok’s knees through his torn pants burned Bryton, adding to the pressure on his neck.
His mouth gasped, trying to suck in air but couldn’t. They struggled, Karok pushing down and Bryton clawing and kicking blindly. She raised her palm to blast a funnel of air but stopped. Even if she could summon wind inside this magical waterfall, she could hit Bryton. Karok ground the handle with increasing strength, his arms trembling under his force. Bryton’s lips turned dusky blue.
He will not die alone.
She jerked hard against the tow of enchantment. Her essence shrieked, the sound of an owl swooping on prey. Her bones shook in her skin and she stumbled, crashing into solid form with a pained gasp. Dust coated her tongue and clogged her throat as she slammed against the floor. Her muscles quivered with expended force but she drew her knees beneath her and began to crawl to Bryton.
“Bitch!” Karok kicked out, his boot tip catching her in the ribs. Starlight exploded in her sight. Bone crunched. A razor-sharp band wrapped around her chest, pain cutting off all attempts to breathe.
Bryton’s strangled gurgle pierced her screaming mind. Karok’s grip never lessened on the axe handle. The word Justice was framed between his bloody hands, Bryton’s Adam’s apple bulging beneath it. Frantic strength flooded her muscles, the burst of power born not of magic but pure human love. She must reach Bryton. She pushed to her knees once more and launched herself at Karok with a hawk’s screech and a woman’s love strengthening her.
Demonic wrath glittered in his eyes as Salome crashed into him. It was like hitting a stone wall but walls could fall and he did beneath her propelled force. She landed on top of him, knocking the axe handle away. She opened her mouth and clamped on Karok’s tight shoulder, driving her teeth down until she tasted thick salty blood. At the same time, she sank her nails deep into his neck. His scream curdled her stomach but she bit harder.
