Swallowing my fear, I turned to face the forest again. I stiffened my resolve, drew my blade, and walked forward. One step, then another, and another. I reached the edge of the woods and paused there, sensing the presence of my enemy. I couldn’t see him, but I knew he was near, and likely had been ever since I’d arrived.
My fingers tightened on the hilt of my blade, and I stepped through the first line of trees and into the darker area beyond. “Where are you?” I called out.
“Waiting,” he answered, and his hoarse voice had little substance. Like the voice of a ghost. He must be weakening. No, it wouldn’t do to underestimate him. Perhaps that was only what he wanted me to think.
I moved forward a few more steps, which took me beyond the clusters of trees on this side and into a small clearing. Pines towered all around me, a circle made by nature. Standing in a half crouch on a carpet of grass, I moved my fingers on the hilt and scanned the shadows that loomed amid the trees.
I didn’t see him. Didn’t hear him. Instead, I felt him; the crushing impact of his aged body when he hurled himself at me from behind. The red-hot trail his blade left as it arched across my back.
I hit the ground hard, face first, but rolled fast and sprang to my feet again. He’d knocked the wind out of me, taken me by surprise, and sliced my flesh. I pulsed with pain, felt the blood dampening my blouse, soaking through it, to stain the cloak.
Facing him, I reached to the ties at my neck and pulled, then tossed the cloak aside. “You had the advantage, Nathanial,” I told him, careful to keep the pain from my voice. “And wasted it.”
“Too eager to see my enemy bleed, I suppose.”
“No more than I am.” I lunged and swept my dagger’s tip across his soft belly, drawing away just as quickly and avoiding his return thrust. We battled, fought, nicked and cut each other, but neither scored a killing blow.
We circled each other, both of us breathless, then lunged again, slashing and stabbing in a tangle of blades and limbs and then drawing back again.
I was tiring, panting.
He danced forward, I danced back, into the thickest cluster of trees. Then I focused on the pines. Their scent, the stringy, sticky bark, the needles that whispered their secrets all around me with every breath of a breeze that passed through them. In effect, I vanished. Melded with the pine trees and, in silence, thought of Trees Speaking and all he’d taught me.
When Nathanial pursued me, he slowed, stilled. His eyes darting this way and that as he searched for me. Then narrowing as he understood.
“You’re very good,” he whispered. Then thrust his dagger into the trunk of the tree nearest him. “Very good. But you can’t keep your focus long. I’ll find you, Raven.”
Not long, he was right. But long enough.
My feet are roots, sinking deep into the rich, black earth.
I curled my toes. I wouldn’t move. Not yet. To move would break the enchantment. I’d wait until he turned his back to me. It would give me the advantage I needed if I hoped to survive.
My body is still and strong, and my skin is like bark. The blood in my veins is pine sap, sticky and smelling of the very spirit of Earth herself.
Nathanial came closer, jabbed another tree.
My arms are limbs. Each nerve ending a fine needle, quivering, sighing on the breeze.
I could feel my heart pounding, hear it in my ears as Nathanial came still nearer, stabbing his blade into first one trunk and then another, until he reached the one right beside me. So loud, that beat in my chest. So strong with fear as I stood motionless, praying he wouldn’t hear it. It’s the pulse of life through my trunk. It’s the thrum of the spirit in me. I told myself anything to keep the image alive, the image I projected, the only thing between Nathanial’s blade and my heart right now.
He came closer, lifted his blade, tilted its tip up and spasmodically clenched his fist on the hilt.
Just as he thrust it at me, I let the image dissolve and dodged to the side. He missed me cleanly, but stood grinning at me all the same. “You can’t outwit me, Raven,” he said. “Never that. I’m too old, too clever to be fooled by your tricks.”
I couldn’t even argue it. “So I see. Then I suppose my only hope is to outfight you.”
“We both know you cannot.”
“We’ll see.” I lurched, swinging my blade, and when he dodged the blow, I leaped and kicked him hard in the belly. A loud grunt gusted from him as he doubled over. By the time he got his breath and straightened again, I was racing through the trees, taking an uphill course. If I could tire the old man, I might stand a chance of beating him. Maybe. If he were as desperate for a heart as he’d claimed, he should be weak. He should lack stamina.
He’d shown no signs of it so far, though. And if he’d lied–
I wouldn’t think of that now.
He gave chase. I knew when I paused for a breath and heard him crashing through the pines, branches snapping, needles raining to the ground in his wake like minuscule raindrops, whispering down.
Higher, then. And I ran on.
And then the trees parted before me, opening all at once onto a sheer drop to the sea. Planting my feet, I nearly overbalanced. My arms whirled backward twice, then I went still, blinking at the vista spread out below my feet. Endless space, and below it, jagged rocks winking and blinking up at me as the waves covered and uncovered them. White froth.
“Oh, now, this is amusing.”
I turned slowly, faced Nathanial. He stood in a powerful crouch, and if his face was flushed, it was with excitement, not exhaustion. His eyes gleamed. He wasn’t tired. If anything he was thriving on this battle. “You made a grave mistake, didn’t you, Raven?”
Grimly I knew Arianna had been right. I didn’t have the skills to beat him. I’d never beaten him. And if I fought him now, he would kill me. And then perhaps he’d kill Duncan.
But if I didn’t....
He’d promised he would go after Duncan anyway.
I couldn’t die here. I had to survive, even if it meant running from this fight. At least that way I would be alive to warn Duncan, to protect him, or try to. Goddess, I should have listened to Arianna in the first place. She’d told me I couldn’t beat him.
I looked to the left, to the right. In the distance I saw two forms coming toward me. Far below, they moved along a path leading up to these cliffs. And as I stared down at them, focused my vision, I saw the woman’s soft blond hair riffling in the breeze, and then the dark locks of the man beside her. Arianna...and Duncan. As if sensing my eyes on them, they both looked up. Duncan pointed, and I saw his lips move. It was likely he called my name, though he was too far away for me to hear him. Then the two ran. They’d be here soon.
I met Nathanial’s eyes again. Cold.
“Yes,” he said, having seen my thoughts in my eyes. “But by the time they arrive, you’ll be dead. And I’ll be gone. And know this as you die, Raven. I will take Duncan’s heart, too, once you’re out of the way. Your friend can’t protect him forever.”
I narrowed my eyes on him. He was lying. I saw it there clearly. He wouldn’t take Duncan’s heart unless he had to. And he wouldn’t even attempt it while Arianna was nearby. He feared her.
But there was no time to work this out in my mind any further, because he leaped at me. His blade drove directly at my midsection, and though I moved to block the thrust, I moved too late. Hot steel sank deep into my belly. Burning pain, terrible pain. I cried out, but all that emerged was a gurgling sound and a mouthful of blood.
He jerked the blade out again. Then he reached for me. And I knew he would hold me and carve into my chest, rip out my heart, end it all now. I took a single step backward as he reached for me. And there was nothing there. Air. I fell into its breath. In silence I plummeted. No sound at all. Not until the impact.
* * * *
Duncan ran. His lungs worked in a way he’d never felt them work before. Efficiently. Powerfully. The beat of his heart seemed like an engine. Unstoppable
, strong. His legs pushed his body to speeds greater than he could have reached before. But he didn’t marvel at these changes. Only noted them and felt grateful, because it meant he could reach Raven faster.
He could still see her, facing his father–or the man he’d called his father–on the cliffs. Nathanial moved closer, until Raven seemed trapped.
“We’re not going to make it in time,” Duncan rasped.
“We have to.” Arianna’s voice was a monotone of utter determination.
Then Nathanial drove forward, and Raven went stiff. Duncan could see her eyes widen, see her lips move, and the scarlet that bubbled from them. She looked down, then toward him. And Nathanial jerked his blade from her belly.
“No!” Duncan screamed with a voice that rolled like thunder, like the words of the gods themselves; his command broke the silent pause on that cliff. “Dammit, Nathanial, leave her alone!”
But it was as if no one heard. Nathanial reached out. Raven stepped back and into oblivion. She didn’t even cry out. Just fell. Just fell. He could hear her clothes snapping like flags in the wind, see her hair fluttering. He screamed her name in anguish. His head felt as if it were exploding, splitting, when her body hit the rocks below. A shock went through him. Pain, horror, devastation,
And memory. The clear, vivid memory of all of this happening before.
His heart filled with long-repressed emotions, unbearable emotions he realized had been there all along. Condensed, perhaps, and bottled up somewhere. But the bottle had shattered and the feelings swelled until he didn’t think he could contain them. And then he was running, clambering, half climbing, half falling, sending a shower of rocks down the cliffs before him, hearing their plunking sounds as they hit the water. Sliding, skinning his hands and chin and every other part of him, tearing his clothes, he made his way to the bottom.
And then he paused on the shore and searched the unforgiving waves for her.
There.
She lay face up, half submerged. Her head and one shoulder and arm were sprawled on a sloped rock. The rest of her body submerged, broken, as the waves tugged at it, so steadily and greedily that she’d be swept out to sea soon.
He moved as if entranced. Sloshing into the water, walking out deeper, deeper, then swimming. He’d kicked free of his shoes at some point. He wasn’t certain when. But he reached that rock and pulled himself up onto its slick surface. And then he gathered her broken body into his arms.
Limp. So limp, so shattered. A porcelain doll smashed and tossed aside.
“No,” he whispered. “No, not now. God, Raven, not now.”
Her long hair was dripping with seawater that streamed over her face and shoulders. He gently smoothed it, stroked her face with his hand as his tears came. Burning hot, like acid on his cheeks, they flowed. They fell, and mingled with the water on her lips.
He clung tighter, pulling her full against him, rocking her slowly and weeping without control, without shame. So tightly, he held her body pressed to his, her lifeless head heavy on his shoulder. The enormity of it crushed down on him all at once. To have loved her this much, this damn much, so much it was every part of him, every cell, every breath, his soul, his life...all his lives. How could he not have known? How could he not have felt this? And now, now when he finally did feel it, and know it and recognize it for what it was, and remember it, she was gone. She was gone. Oh, God, she was gone!
He kissed her face, her hair, as sobs rose up and tore at his chest, threatening to split him in two. Now he understood how she’d felt all those years ago, when she’d held his lifeless, broken body on these rocks. Now he understood what she had faced. All those years alone. God, they stretched out before him like a desert, where every grain of sand was a shard of glass, and which he had to cross barefoot without a sip of water.
“I willna,” he whispered. “I canna do it, Raven. I dinna know how you did, but I canna. I canna go on without you, lass.”
She had, though. Her strength must be an awesome thing, to enable her to survive with this kind of pain. Three hundred years. Three centuries, she’d dealt with it.
“An’ when you found me again, what did I do? God, Raven, what did I do to you? I trusted him, believed him.” He let her head fall backward, staring down at her face, so pale and still and lovely. “How that must have hurt you. How could I hurt you like that? You, you, Raven, my soul, my heart. How many times will I lose you this way? How many times?”
Still. So still. So dead. He closed his eyes and held her, loving her with everything in him, and another memory came to him. He was standing there, holding her in his arms for the first time. Beneath a gallows as he sawed at the filthy rope with a pilfered blade. And held her, and cried for the woman he didn’t even know.
But he had. He’d known her then, somehow. Some way. His soul had recognized hers. His heart had known hers, and he’d loved her. He’d loved her from the first moment he’d set eyes on her.
“I told you I wasna the man you remembered, Raven. But I am. I’m Duncan Wallace, an’ I was born in 1675 in the land of the Scots, the land of my father an’ his before him. I’m the man who loved you all those lifetimes ago, an’ I love you still, Raven St. James. I love you still.”
He drew a breath, somehow got to his feet, and holding her cradled as carefully as if she were made of crystal, he drew her with him as he made his way to shore. He wouldn’t leave her to the sea. He couldn’t. Something was niggling at him through his anguish. A faint, desperate hope that wouldn’t leave him alone. He didn’t want to let the hope form fully, for fear it would only destroy him if it turned out to be a false one. But as he stepped out of the waves and carried her onto the shore, he couldn’t suppress it any longer.
He laid her down, in the lush green grass, in a spot dotted with tiny blue forget-me-nots. And then he sat beside her, leaned over her, and gently spread her hair to dry in the grasses. “That first time I held you, lass, that first time I wept for you, you were nay dead then. You survived that noose. You told me you were immortal. You told me you couldna die unless the bastard took your heart.” He closed his eyes, recalling the thrust of Nathanial’s blade, but he’d been so far away. He couldn’t tell.
“Tell me that bastard didna do that.”
Gently he touched the front of her torn, bloodstained blouse. Even the cool kiss of the ocean hadn’t washed those stains away. Nothing would, and he hoped nothing would wash them from Nathanial’s hands, either.
His heart in his throat, he prayed in silence. Please, please, dinna let it be....
Opening her blouse, he stared down at her chest. Pale, beaded with droplets of seawater, but unmaimed. There was no gaping hole, no wound near her heart.
He spread the blouse further and saw the wound she had suffered, the deep cut of Nathanial’s blade, high in her belly. But even as he looked, that wound began to heal. Its edges puckered and pulled in on themselves as if magnetized. One side met the other, pressed like a kiss, and seemed to meld before his eyes.
Stunned, he drew his gaze upward, focused on her face, afraid to believe, afraid to hope.
“Raven?”
And then she went rigid, back arching off the ground, hands clenching fistfuls of grass at her sides, heels pressing the earth. Her neck arched as well, chin pointing skyward, and she sucked in a harsh, greedy breath. It made him think of electrocution, that brief seizure. Her eyes went wide, too wide, for just an instant. And then her body relaxed again, and she lay limp on the ground, blinking slowly, staring at him from unfocused eyes.
“Raven,” he whispered. “Raven, Raven, Raven.” He slipped his arms around her, beneath her, lifting her gently against him, holding her close, but not close enough. It would never be close enough. She hugged his neck, so pliable in his arms, melting there. His hands burying themselves in her hair, he drew her head back slightly, and then he pressed his lips to hers, kissing her more deeply, more urgently than he had in this lifetime. Kissing her the way he had before, in that other time, wh
en he’d known what she was to him. Because he knew it now. He finally knew it now.
She blinked in confusion when he lifted his head away. Her slender, perfect fingers touched his cheeks, touched the tears there as she frowned. He couldn’t speak, couldn’t put the overwhelming things he was feeling into words. Not yet, not yet. He felt as if he’d been lost, wandering and lost, and searching, and now he’d found her. He’d found himself. He’d come home.
He bent and kissed her again, and this time he didn’t stop. His hands pushed her blouse away, caressed her breasts, felt them warming, felt her entire body warming to his touch. He kissed her neck, her shoulders, her belly, where that wound had been. He kissed the place where her heart beat in her chest and willed that it would always remain there, strong and alive and full of love for him. He kissed her hips as he undressed her. Her thighs. Her center, where he lingered. How he loved her. How he’d always loved her.
She whispered his name with her heart in her breath and her hands in his hair, and he tasted more of her, wanted to devour her, make her truly a part of him, take her inside him somehow and keep her there, cherished and safe. Always safe.
When she cried out, he moved up over her body once more. He ran his hands over her flesh. Living and warm. Over limbs, alive and responsive now, no longer limp and broken. Did she know what she was to him? Could she know? My God, was it even possible that he was that much to her, as well?
Yes. It shone from her eyes and danced on her tremulous as she opened to him, held him, drew him down, took him inside her. She held his gaze as he moved, and she moved with him. Rocked him, loved him. He stared right into her eyes, into her soul, it seemed, as he made love to her. And the pounding of her heart and the pounding of his own blended with the pounding of the waves against the shore until it was all one. All one...and he felt as if he and she were one. A single soul that had been split for a time, united again at long last. She never blinked, nor did he. And when her lips parted and her breaths came in short little gasps, and he rode her faster and harder and deeper, their gazes remained locked. He felt their souls connect and touch, through their eyes.
Eternal Love: The Immortal Witch Series Page 31
