Narcissus in Chains ab-10

by Laurell Hamilton

  "You sound bitter about it," he said.

  I nodded. "Oh, yeah."

  "You must both accept who and what you are, or you will make yourselves miserable," Rafael said.

  We both looked at him, and I don't think either look was friendly. "Give me a week or two to come to terms with being a kitty cat," I said.

  "I am not referring to you being Nimir-Ra for real," Rafael said. "From the moment I met you, Anita, you have half hated what you are. As Richard has run from his beast, so you have run from your own gifts."

  "I don't need a philosophy lesson, Rafael."

  "I think you do, and badly, but I'll let that go, if it bothers you so very much."

  "Don't even start on me," Reece said. "I've had people preach to me all my life that I'm blessed and not cursed. If my entire family couldn't convince me of it, you might as well not even try."

  Rafael shrugged, then turned back to me. "Let's pick a different topic, because we are only minutes away from the lupanar, and I saw Micah's beast-- his energy--pass through you, and your beast responded."

  "You saw it?" I asked.

  He nodded. "His energy is very blue, and yours is very red, and they mingled."

  "So you got what, purple?" I said.

  Micah hugged me a little tighter, a warning I think not to be flippant, but Rafael was more direct. "No jokes, Anita, if I saw it, so will Richard."

  "He's my Nimir-Raj," I said.

  "You don't understand, Anita. Micah said he thought birthmarks in the shape of your beast was legend. Well, until just now, I believed talk of a perfect mate was legend. Like true fated love, just a romantic story." Rafael's already serious face got even more solemn. "You recognize some bond from the beginning, so the stories go, but it's only after you have sex for the first time that your beasts can roll through each other's bodies. Only physical intimacy will allow such metaphysical intimacy."

  I glanced down from those hard, demanding eyes, but finally made myself look back up. "What are you asking, Rafael?"

  "Not really asking, telling. Telling you that I know you had sex with Micah, and that, even though Richard has dumped you and publicly declared that you and he are no longer a couple, he won't like it."

  That was an understatement. I pulled away from Micah, and he let me go, no lingering touches. I moved away, and he allowed it. It earned him brownie points. "Richard dumped me, Rafael, not the other way around. He doesn't have any right to bitch about what I do."

  "If he dumped her, then she's free to do what she wants," Reece said. "The Ulfric has only himself to blame."

  "Logically, you're right, but when has logic dictated how a man acts when he sees the love of his life in someone else's arms?" The bitter way Rafael said it made me look at him, study his face. He sounded like he was speaking from experience.

  "As Ulfric to my Nimir-Ra, he has no authority over me."

  "Tonight is going to be dangerous enough, Anita. You don't need to make Richard angry."

  "I don't want to make things worse. God knows they're bad enough as they are."

  "You're angry with him for dumping you," Rafael said.

  I started to say no, then realized he might be right. "Maybe."

  "You want to hurt him."

  I started to say no, then stopped and tried to think--really think--about how I felt. I was angry and hurt that he could just cast me aside. Okay, it hadn't been that simple, but still ... "Yeah, I'm hurt, and maybe a part of me wants to punish Richard for that, but it's not just him dumping me. It's the mess he's made of the pack. He's endangered people I care about, and he's doing his usual Boy Scout shit that doesn't even work well in the human world, let alone with a bunch of werewolves. I'm tired, Rafael, I'm tired of it, and him."

  "It sounds like you might have dumped him if he hadn't beat you to it."

  "I came back to make it work. To see if we could make some sense of it all. But he has to give up that moral code of his that has never worked for him or anyone around him."

  "To give up his moral code is to give up being who he is."

  I nodded. "I know." And just saying that made me feel worse. "He can't change, and staying who he is is going to get him killed."

  "And maybe you and Jean-Claude with him," Rafael said.

  "Does everyone know that part?"

  "It's standard that if you kill a vampire's human servant, the vampire may not survive the death. And if you kill a vampire, their human servants either die or go crazy. Logic dictates that killing either of you endangers the other."

  I still didn't like that everyone knew that to kill one of us might kill all of us. Made it too damn easy for assassins. "What do you want me to say, Rafael? That Richard and I have a fundamental difference of philosophy in nearly every important area? There's more than one reason we didn't get married and live happily ever after. That maybe he's going to have to choose between survival or his morals? That I'm afraid he'd almost rather die than compromise those morals? Yeah, I'm afraid. It's going to kill a little piece of him to see me with Micah. I'd spare him if I could, but I didn't choose any of this."

  "You take no blame in this," Rafael said.

  I sighed. "If I hadn't left for six months maybe I could have talked him out of the democracy with his pack. Maybe if I'd been here a lot of things would be different, but I wasn't here, and I can't change that. All I can do is try fix what got broke."

  "You think you can fix this, all of it?" Rafael asked.

  I shrugged. "Ask me again after I've met Jacob and seen how Richard deals as Ulfric with all of them. I need a feel for the dynamics before I say if it's fixable."

  "How would you fix it?" Micah asked.

  I glanced back at him. "If Jacob and a few others are the problem, then it's fixable."

  "Killing the ones who stand against Richard won't fix things, Anita," Rafael said. "The experiment in democracy must end. Richard must begin being harsher to those who would stand against him. He must be frightening to them, or there will be another Jacob, and another after that."

  I nodded. "You're preaching to the choir here, Rafael."

  "If you are not his girlfriend, or his lover, then I fear that your influence over Richard will be slight."

  "I'm not sure I had a lot of influence over him when we were dating."

  "If you cannot talk sense into him, then eventually Richard will die and someone else, probably Jacob, will take over the pack. The first thing any good conqueror does is kill those closest and most loyal to the executed leader."

  "You think Jacob is that practical?" I asked.

  "Yes," Rafael said.

  "What do you want me to do?"

  "I want you to hide the fact that you and Micah are lovers."

  I glanced behind me at Micah. He shrugged, face peaceful. "I told you I wanted you on any terms that you wished, Anita. What do I have to do to convince you I meant that?"

  I searched his face, tried to find something false in it, and couldn't. Maybe he was that good a liar. Maybe I was just being too suspicious. "When we were with the leopards, just the leopards, I was completely comfortable with you. It felt right and ... why doesn't it feel that way now?"

  "You're having second thoughts," Reece said.

  "No," Rafael said. He looked at Micah, and the two of them had major eye contact.

  The staring contest went on so long that I had to interrupt. "One of you better start talking," I said.

  Rafael inclined his head at Micah, as if to say, go ahead. I turned to Micah. "Alright," he said, and he seemed to be choosing his words carefully. I was almost positive I wasn't going to like this conversation. "Every pard, every group of shifters that is healthy has a group mind."

  "You mean a group identity?" I asked.

  "Not exactly. It's more ..." He frowned. "It's more like a coven that's worked magic together for a while. They begin to be parts of a whole when it comes to working magic or healing. Together they form more than they form separately."

  "Okay, but what's tha
t have to do with why I felt more comfortable when it was just us leopards?"

  "If you feel differently when the leopards are around you, then we're forming a group mind. It usually takes months to forge that kind of bond between shifters. Maybe it's just a bond with your own leopards. The change coming on could have set it in motion."

  "But you think it's more than that, don't you?"

  He nodded. "I think you're forming a group mind with my pard; that in effect, the decision to join our pards into one unit has already been made."

  "I haven't decided anything."

  "Haven't you?" he asked. He looked so reasonable sitting there, hands clasped in front of him, leaning a little towards me. So earnest.

  "Look, the sex was great. But I'm not ready to pick out china patterns here, you do understand that?" There was a feeling very close to panic in the pit of my stomach.

  "Sometimes your beast picks for you," Rafael said.

  I looked at him. "What does that mean?"

  "If you are already a part of a group mind with his pard, then your beast has chosen for you, Anita. It's more intimate than being his lover, because it's not just him that you have a commitment to."

  I gave him wide eyes. "Are you saying that I'm going to feel responsible for the safety and well-being of all his wereleopards as well as my own?"

  Rafael nodded. "Probably."

  I looked back at Micah. "How about you? You feel responsible for my people?"

  He sighed, and it was heavy, not happy at all. "I didn't expect to form a bond this quickly. I've never seen it work this fast."

  "And?" I said.

  His mouth moved, almost a smile. "And, if we've really formed a group mind, then yes, I'll feel responsible for your people."

  "You don't sound happy about that."

  "Nothing personal, but your cats are a mess."

  "Yours are so much healthier," I said, "Gina looks like someone who's been kicked once too often."

  Micah's eyes hardened, and he searched my face. "No one talked to you. They wouldn't dare."

  "No one tattled, Micah, but I could see it on her, smell the defeat. Someone's damn near broken her, and it's recent, or ongoing. She got a bad boyfriend?"

  His face closed down. He didn't like that I'd figured that out. "Something like that." But his pulse had sped up, and I knew he was hiding something from me, something that scared him.

  "What aren't you telling me, Micah?"

  His gaze flicked past me to Rafael. "Will she be able to read my people more easily as time goes on."

  "And you hers," Rafael said.

  "Her people are pretty easy to read now," he said.

  I was watching his face. He was controlling his body, keeping the tension out of it, but I could taste the speed of his pulse, and the fear. It wasn't just a small fear either. The thought that I could read his people so completely almost terrified him.

  I laid my hand over his clasped ones, and he turned serious, guarded eyes to me. "Why does it scare you that I knew that Gina is being abused?"

  He tensed under my hand and pulled away, gently, but he definitely didn't want me to touch him. "Gina wouldn't like it if you knew."

  "As her Nimir-Raj, aren't you supposed to protect her from abusive assholes?"

  "I've done my best for her," he said, but it sounded defensive.

  "Kick the guy's ass and forbid her to see him again. It's a simple problem, don't complicate it. Or is she in love with him?"

  He shook his head, eyes down, his hands clutching so tight that the skin mottled. His voice came out even, normal, but that terrible tension shook through his hands. "No, she's not in love with him."

  "Then what's the problem?"

  "It's more complicated than you could ever imagine." He looked up, and there was anger in his eyes now.

  I started to reach out, to touch him, then let my hand fall back. "If we really are forming one pard. If I really am her Nimir-Raj, then no one's allowed to hurt her. No one hurts my people."

  "The wolves took your Gregory," he said. The anger was still in his eyes, trembling down his hands.

  "And we're going to get him back."

  "I know you've had a hard life. I've heard some of the stories, but you talk as if you're young and naive. Sometimes no matter how hard you try, you can't save everyone."

  It was my turn to look down. "I've lost people. I've failed people, and they've gotten hurt, and dead." I raised my eyes to meet his gaze. "But the people who hurt them, killed them, they're dead too. Maybe I can't keep everyone safe, but I'm damn fine at revenge."

  "But the harm still happens. The dead don't really walk again. Zombies are just corpses, Anita. They aren't the people you lost."

  "I know that last better than you do, Micah."

  He nodded. Some of the terrible tension had eased away from him, but I left his eyes haunted with some old pain that was still raw.

  "I've done everything I can for Gina and the others, and it's still not enough. It will never be enough."

  I touched his hands, and this time he let me slide my hands over his. "Maybe together we can be enough for them all."

  He searched my face. "You really mean that, don't you?"

  "Anita rarely says anything she doesn't mean," Rafael said, "but if I were her, I'd ask first what the problems are before I promised to fix them."

  I had to smile. "I was just about to ask, what is Gina into that's got you so terrified?"

  He turned his hands so he was holding mine tight. He looked into my eyes. The look was not love, or even lust, but so serious. "Let's save your leopard first, then ask me again, and I'll tell you all of it."

  The car slowed and turned. Gravel sounded under the tires. It was the turn-off to the farm that fronted the woods around the lupanar.

  "Tell me some of it now, Micah. I need something here, now."

  He sighed, looked down at his clasped hands, then up, slowly to meet my eyes. "Once we were taken over by a very bad man. He still wants us, and I'm searching for a home strong enough to keep us safe."

  "Why are you afraid to tell me?"

  His eyes widened a little. "Most pards don't want that kind of trouble."

  I smiled. "Trouble is my middle name."

  He looked a little puzzled. I guess I was the only one who liked film noir. "I'm not going to kick you guys out because of some asshole alpha. Let me know which way the danger's coming from, and I'll deal with it."

  "I wish I had your confidence."

  There was a weight to his gaze of such sorrow, such horrible loss. It made me shiver to see it, and he let go of my hands, sliding away from me just before Merle opened the door and offered a hand out. He didn't take the hand, but he slid out into the dark.

  Reece followed him with a look at Rafael, as if the rat king had told him to get out and give us some privacy. I turned to Rafael. "You have something to say?"

  "Be careful of that one, Anita. None of us know him, or his people."

  "Funny, I was pretty much thinking the same thing."

  "Even though he can make your beast roil through your body?"

  I met his dark, dark eyes. "Maybe especially because of that."

  Rafael smiled. "I should know by now that you are not a person to let her affections cloud her vision."

  "Oh, it can be clouded, but never for long."

  "You sound wistful," he said.

  "Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to actually be able to just fall in love and not weigh the risks first."

  "If it works out, it's the best thing in the world. If it doesn't work out, it's like having your heart torn out and chopped up into little pieces while you watch. It leaves a big hollow space that never really heals."

  I looked at him, unsure what to say, but finally, "You sound like experience talking."

  "I've got an ex-wife and a son. They live in a different state, as far away from me as she could drag him."

  "What went wrong, if you don't mind me asking?"

  "She
wasn't strong enough to handle what I am. I didn't hide anything from her. She knew everything before we married. If I hadn't been so much in love with her, I'd have seen that she was weak. It's my job as king to know who's strong and who isn't. But she fooled me, because I wanted to be fooled. I know that now. She is what she is--not her fault. I can't even regret her getting pregnant right away. I love my son."

  "Do you ever get to see him?"

  He shook his head. "I get to fly in twice a year and have supervised visits. She's made him afraid of me."

  I started to reach out to him, hesitated, then thought, what the hell. I took his hand, and he looked startled, then smiled. "I'm sorry, Rafael, more than I can ever say."

  He squeezed my hand then moved back from me. "Just thought you ought to know that falling blindly in love isn't at all the way all those poems and songs make it sound. It hurts like hell."

  "I did fall in love like that once," I said.

  He raised his eyebrows at me. "Not since I've known you."

  "No, in college. I was engaged, thought it was true love."

  "What happened?"

  "His mom found out my mother was Mexican, and she didn't want her little blond-haired, blue-eyed, family tree getting contaminated."

  "You were engaged before they'd met your family?"

  "They'd met my father and his second wife, but they are both good little Aryans, very nordic. My stepmother didn't like pictures of my mother being out, so they were all in my room. I wasn't hiding it, but that's how my almost mother-in-law took it. Funny thing, her son knew. I'd told him the whole story. It hadn't mattered until his mom threatened to cut him off from the family money."

  "Now I'm sorry."

  "Your story is more pitiful."

  "That doesn't make me feel better," he said, smiling.

  I smiled back, but neither of us really looked happy. "Ain't love grand?" I said.

  "You can answer your own question after you see Richard and Micah in the lupanar together."

  I shook my head. "I don't love Micah, not really, not yet."

  "But," he said.

  I sighed. "But I almost wish I did. It would make seeing Richard less painful. I don't know how I'm going to feel seeing him tonight and knowing that he's not mine anymore."