“No.”
What the hell? “What do you mean no? Why wouldn’t you leave me alone if no one can make me do it?”
“I did not say that I would not leave you alone. I meant that I will not be returning to my realm.”
“But you hate humans and Witches. Why wouldn’t you go back?”
“Because I cannot.”
Now I understand. “Because you’re a traitor now for coming through trying to stop me.”
He stands up brushing the snow off from him and looks towards Maurelle and Olwyn who seem to have passed out at some point. “No.”
I am so frustrated that I scream at him. “Stop it! Stop talking in riddles and just tell me what you’re talking about for once for god’s sake.”
Focusing his eyes back on me, he says, “I cannot go back to my realm unless you create a way back.” Pointing at the other two Fairies, he says, “Neither can they.”
My mouth drops open. “You can’t go back?”
“No.”
“Then why did you come if you knew you had to either stay here or die with me?”
He takes his eyes off mine but not before I see the sorrow there for the loss of his world. “Because someone very important to me asked me to do it.”
“Who would ask you to do something so awful?”
“My grandmother asked me to make a sacrifice for the greater good and I agreed.”
I shake my head. “You’re an idiot.”
He laughs but not with humor. “You do keep pointing that out.”
Looking at Maurelle and Olwyn who have not wakened yet, I say, “So as long as they are alive, they will keep trying to force me to open the gateway otherwise they will be stuck here.” Looking back at Kallen, I ask, “Are you going to kill them?”
He shakes his head. “No, that is not the Sheehogue way.”
“I don’t trust you anymore.”
He actually has the decency to look bothered by that. “I have never lied to you.”
“No, you haven’t but that doesn’t mean that I won’t constantly be on the alert for you to decide that it is better for me to die than keep fighting.”
His eyes focus with a shock of green on mine. “I want you to keep fighting.”
“But wanting that doesn’t change the fact that you feel that you get to decide if I live or die.” Wasn’t I just thinking not that long ago that my life couldn’t get any worse? I need to stop thinking that. It seems to be a challenge for the cosmos to prove me wrong.
Standing up, I start walking away from all of them. I don’t know how long those two will be out and I don’t know if I have a never ending ability to pull more and more magic from the earth so the more space I put between us the better. Right now, I feel emotionally and physically drained and I don’t know how much of that is the result of pulling so much magic and how much is the result of everything I just learned on top of how fantastical the rest of my week has been. Maybe Mom shouldn’t have tried to keep me alive because apparently, I was born with a great big bulls eye on my forehead.
Chapter 12
“Xandra, where are you going?” Kallen asks as he begins to follow me.
“Go away, Kallen. I’m going home.”
“Home?” He sounds shocked. Gee, imagine that, I want to go home. What a big surprise that should be.
“You cannot go home.” He says that like I’m an idiot. Like he says most things to me. I certainly won’t miss that.
“Watch me,” I say as I keep walking, hopefully in the right direction.
“But that is not safe.”
I shrug my shoulders and keep walking. “I don’t know, I seemed to be able to defend myself against Maurelle and Olwyn just fine.”
“Protect yourself, what about your family?”
“I’ll protect them, too.” What is he, a moron?
“And what will you do if Maurelle or Olwyn gets their hands on your small brother?”
“The term is little brother and I’ll do what I just did.”
“You will send your magic burning through your brother?” he asks in bewilderment.
He is a moron. “No, of course not. Will you please stop following me?”
“Do you not understand that if you send your magic searing through Maurelle or Olwyn whoever they are touching at the time will also feel its effects?” Crap. No, I didn’t know that. “It is also a huge physical drain to use so much magic at once. You will become weak and then indefensible.” Guess that answers the question about why I feel exhausted.
“I’ll figure something out. Something that doesn’t involve you.”
“Xandra, please. Let me help you figure this out.”
“No thanks. If I decide to off myself to protect the lowly Cowan and Witches, I’d rather do it without giving you the satisfaction of seeing it happen.”
“I would derive no satisfaction from you ‘offing’ yourself if that term means what I believe it means.” Catching up to me he grabs my arm and pulls me to a stop. Dammit, my amulet is buried under ten feet of snow.
“Will you please listen to me?”
I shake his hand off my arm. “No.”
He looks to be at a complete loss. Hmm, maybe I’ve finally rendered him speechless. Oh, how much better the world will be because of it. I start to turn away from him and he catches my face between his hands. Before I can blink, his lips are on mine.
At first I’m stunned but now I’m mad. I push him away and he breaks off the kiss instantly with a surprised look on his face. “What, you thought you’d kiss me and then I’d go weak at the knees and do whatever you want? Maybe that works for you in Fairy land but you’re not nearly a good enough kisser to make it happen here.” I turn on my heel and start walking again. I hear him following me but I’m not speaking to him anymore. What a jerk! I bet he actually thought his kiss could fix everything. I guess that speaks volumes about what he thinks of me and my self-respect.
Half an hour later, I’m exhausted, drained and very lost. What I’d give for a compass right about now. And an instruction book to tell me how to use it. About ten feet ahead of me, there’s large tree lying on its side. I walk over to it and brush off the snow and then sit down to rest. Unfortunately, so does Kallen.
“I find myself again in a situation where I have to apologize to you for kissing you at inappropriate times,” he says without looking at me.
I snort. “Like there’s an appropriate time.”
“You seem to drive me to distraction and it’s the one thing that pops in my mind to do to end our continual bickering.” He sounds like he has a hard time believing what he’s saying. Yeah, so do I.
“So, in other words, you kiss me to shut me up. Wow, I have no idea why I’m not swooning at your feet.”
“Do Cowan women still swoon?” he asks in wonder.
I give him a dirty look and shake my head. “You are too much.”
“Too much of what?” He seems to realize that he left himself wide open and he adds, “Never mind, I am sure that I will not like the answer you give.”
“Nope, you probably wouldn’t. What’s it going to take to get you to go away?”
“Nothing.”
My hope rises up and I have just a hint of a smile on my face. “You mean you’re just going to go away? Right now?”
He shakes his head. “No, I meant that there is nothing that will make me go away. I swore to protect you and I must do that.”
“Yeah, well, we seem to have different opinions on what protecting me entails because in my book, I don’t end up dead at the end. Tell you what; I’ll let you out of the deal. You’re free. Shoo. Go on your way. Fly like a bird.”
The corners of his mouth lift up. “Would it make you more comfortable if I followed you in my raven form?”
“What about anything I just said made you think that I would be comfortable with you following me in any form? I want you to go away. I released you from your promise to protect me so there’s nothing holding you to me any more.�
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“You cannot release me from a blood oath performed by another Witch. Your mother performed the spell, not you.”
I roll my eyes. “Okay, fine. When I get home I’ll have Mom release you. But you can still go ahead and leave now. I promise not to get killed by anyone else on my way home. What would be the odds of more than three people wanting me dead all at one time?”
A shadow falls over his face which wipes the smile right off from it. Good lord, I went and tempted the cosmos again, didn’t I? “Now what aren’t you telling me?” I demand.
“Nothing,” he says unconvincingly.
I throw my hands up in the air as I stand up and start walking again. “You say you want to stay by my side and protect me yet you still want to keep your little secrets. You know what you should do? You should find a job because I have no intention of opening the gateway to your realm so you’re going to have to support yourself here somehow. Maybe you could be a bartender or something. With your looks, I’m sure you’d be rolling in the tips. I understand there are lots of bars in Denver. Why don’t you go see?”
“The only way for you to open the gateway is if you are sacrificed by your father. Your dying blood will open the realm forever.”
Wow, when he keeps a secret he goes all out. Why couldn’t it have been something like ‘this isn’t my real hair’ or ‘I’m gay which is why I don’t want to kiss you unless I’m mad at you.’ No, he jumps right to ‘your dad wants to kill you so he can destroy humankind.’
I stop and hang my head as I cross my arms over my chest and sigh deeply. “Which is why you’d rather kill me yourself because if I’m going to die anyway it might as well not happen while opening up the Fairy realm.”
“That was the reasoning I came here with, yes. But I no longer feel that way.”
“Ooh, you just up and changed your mind. What a coincidence that it happened right after I found out about your plan.” I start walking again. I need to get off this freaking mountain. I think the thinner air is scrambling my brain because a tiny part of me can understand why Kallen would kill me if that was the only way to stop the king from his plans. The king. My father. My father who wants me dead without even meeting me. That certainly doesn’t do much for my self-esteem.
“That is not when I changed my mind.”
“Please don’t tell me it was after the first time we kissed. This isn’t a Fairy tale. Oh, wait, I guess it is. Still, I don’t see us moving on to a happily ever after. That whole death threat hanging over my head kind of puts a damper on any romantic notions I might have been able to muster for you, Kallen.”
“Xandra.”
He doesn’t say anything else so I manage a half-hearted, “What.”
“Do you have any idea where you are going?”
Crap, I thought I was walking confidently enough that he wouldn’t figure that out. “Yes, I do,” I snap.
He has the nerve to chuckle. “Then are you planning to trek around the world to get to your house? Because it is in the opposite direction.”
No, it can’t be. I stop and turn around in a circle trying to get my bearings. It’s around noon, though, so I can’t use the orientation of the sun to tell me if I’m heading east or west. “So, it’s that way?” I ask pointing in the direction we just came from.
“I would be happy to show you the way.”
I narrow my eyes as I look at him. “Why can’t you just tell me?”
“Because then I would have no leverage to use to convince you to let me come with you.”
I growl in frustration. “Why are you always such a jerk?”
“You know, there are some who find me charming and witty.”
“Good for you, I’m not one of them.” I start walking back the way we came.
“I was just kidding, you were going the right way,” he says and I can hear the laughter in his voice.
That’s it. I’ve had it. I march over to him and putting both hands on his chest I push him. Even though he wasn’t expecting it, he probably wouldn’t have fallen but there is a stump behind him and he trips over it so now he’s flat on his back in the snow. I stand over him with my hands on my hips. “I am so tired of you laughing at me! I am exhausted and cold and I want to go home so stop being a jerk and just tell me which way to go!”
Kallen looks up at me for a long moment and then he nods looking defeated. “Help me up and I’ll tell you.”
Finally, he says something I want to hear. I hold my hand out to him and he takes it but instead of me helping him up, he pulls me down and rolls on top of me. I should have figured it was too good to be true. I’m too tired to fight him either physically or with magic so I just lie there with a disgusted look on my face.
When he realizes that I’m not going to fight him, he takes some of his weight off from me by resting his elbows in the snow and pushing himself up. “I changed my mind before we even started on this journey. I knew that if you were willing to leave your family and go off with a stranger because you thought that it was the only way to keep your world safe that you would never willingly open the gate. That was the only reason I had ever intended to kill you if I had to. Only if you tried to open the gate of your own free will. You are correct. Your magic is strong enough to easily fight off Maurelle and Olwyn but they are determined. They would rather die than stay in this world. Unlike me, they have every intention of finding a way back home and they will use anything and everything they can think of to force you into opening the gate. Xandra, that includes your family. They will exorcise your parents as I said before if that is what it takes. They will kill your aunt and your little brother in front of you if that is what it takes. The Pooka are not peaceful nor do they have the ability to be reasoned with when they have their mind set on something and the king chose these two runners specifically because of their cold-heartedness. Please, let me help you keep any of that from happening. You have my word; there is no situation that could make me decide your death is the only answer.”
Even though I’m absolutely positive that he’s telling the truth, I still can’t bring myself to just give in. “Nice speech, will you please get off from me?”
“May I kiss you first?”
“No.”
With a sigh, he rolls off of me and stands up. He offers his hand out to me but I learn from my mistakes and I don’t take it. Looking up at him, I cock my head and say, “And for future reference, the answer will always be no to that question.”
Something flashes in his eyes but I can’t figure out what, nor do I want to. “Of course,” he says.
I sigh loudly and look down at the ground for several moments. When I finally look back up at him, I ask, “What are we going to eat since our food is buried?”
He’s smart enough to squelch the smile before it really gets going. “This is an excellent opportunity to teach you about both hunting and gathering.”
“Hunting? You mean you expect me to kill an animal and then eat it after seeing it take its last breath? Not going to happen.”
“Then perhaps we should follow tradition and I should hunt while you gather.” I have to give him credit, he’s trying so hard not to express his amusement that I think his eyes are going to start watering soon.
“Fine, just what exactly am I gathering?”
“Wood for a fire.”
“Just wood? I thought you were going to tell me which berries or tree bark or something is edible.”
“Unfortunately, at this altitude at this time of year, there is very little the mountain has to offer as food. We will have to dine on rabbits or possibly deer. And I promise, only I will witness their dying breath.” He still doesn’t laugh. I’m pretty sure that he’s going to burst soon if he doesn’t.
“Fine, go kill a bunny and I’ll pick up some sticks.” I walk away from him and start looking for anything dry that would work for fire wood. Out of the corner of my eye, I see him suddenly holding a bow with arrows. I really want to be able to do cool stuff like that with magic
instead of just being able to hurt people with it.
I’m tempted to just keep walking and take my chances of finding home on my own but as much as my heart wants to, my brain knows that I can’t for all the reasons Kallen said. So, after gathering an armful of wood, I go back to our new little camp of sorts. Kallen is gone for about twenty more minutes and I take the opportunity to sit on the stump I pushed him over and try very hard not to think about anything. My brain needs a rest.
True of Blood (Witch Fairy Series) Page 15
