Undeniably Chosen

by Shelly Crane

  He cupped my face. “Ava, stop,” he ordered softly. “You’re just making yourself upset for nothing.”

  “How can you be so calm? How can you just…”

  “Ava, our lives will always keep moving on whether we want them to or not. Even after tragedy and betrayal, we have to take what’s left of the ashes and do something with them.”

  I stared at him in awe-filled silence along with everyone else.

  “Everyone,” Dad called, “Seth is innocent. Back to your seats.” His Champion voice was one you didn’t trifle with. No one questioned him. They all filed back to their seats and got back to eating. But when I saw Jordan and Drake standing there, I was shocked that they hadn’t obeyed their Champion. He was, too, apparently.

  His eyebrow shot up and his chin went down. “That means you, too,” he said slowly.

  “I know,” Jordan said slowly, “I just have to say sorry to Ava and Seth—”

  “Jordan!” Dad boomed.

  “It’s okay, Dad,” I tried.

  “Ava, we can talk to them later. Right now we need to—”

  “Dad, if I had made an epic blunder that caused my family to go into an uproar of this size, I’d want to apologize right away, too.” Jordan winced, scrunching his nose and rubbing his hair. “Let him.”

  Dad sighed. “Ava—”

  Mom grabbed his shirt front. “Caleb, come on.”

  Dad threw his hands up. “All my women are just going to gang up on me? Does no one listen to their Champion anymore?” Mom just smiled, knowing we’d won.

  “Come eat with me. Let them…” She flitted her hands at us. “Talk.”

  Dad growled and looked at Jordan and Drake. “Your Visionary saved you. I hope you know that.”

  “We do,” Drake said and couldn’t hide his smile, but he was trying. Dad was pretty funny when he was bring “handled” by Mom.

  Dad turned back to Mom and put his arms around her waist as he practically dragged her away. “Gah, you drive me crazy, baby,” he said in that growly, possessive voice I was so used to with them.

  I turned back to Jordan and Drake.

  Drake looked beyond sorry. “I’m so sorry. We were sent there to see if we saw anything out of the ordinary and you…talking about coming here and being a spy is out of the ordinary, man.”

  Seth had his arm around me and his fingers were moving in a soothing rhythm on my back. “I understand. We hadn’t really thought that out, I guess. I knew that Mr. Jacobson was sending someone out to scout, I just thought… I don’t know what I thought,” he said in a rushed breath.

  “You thought they might attack the summit,” Drake said and clapped him on the shoulder. “So did we. But we couldn’t do anything about it but scout things out. We can’t just run every time we think they might do something. That’s not a life. And that’s not in our nature. Thanks for doing that. We’re sorry about everything.”

  “Yeah,” Jordan said and kicked his shoe on the floor. “Really sorry.”

  “Thanks, guys. It’s all okay. Promise,” Seth assured and turned to me without anything else to them.

  They went to sit with them family, but I just wasn’t hungry.

  “Me either.”

  I smiled. “I miss your mind. Even though I’ve never been able to do that and be in your head like you’re in mine, I still miss it terribly,” I said softly.

  His lips twisted, his brow lowered. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why—”

  “It’s not your fault.”

  “There has to be a reason.” His brow went even lower as he thought. “Every couple can hear each other and if you can’t hear me, then it’s some supernatural…motive.”

  I groaned softly, putting my head on his chest. “I don’t want to think about it.”

  With my head on his chest like this I could see my family perfectly. They were doing a poor job of eating and trying to look inconspicuous as they did so and not look like they weren’t watching my every move. Seth was right. My family had always been that way. They focused on the one who was bonding at the time. They had their famous family bar-b-que to welcome them to the family and “grill” them on all their business. They thought they were so clever on that one.

  And they just kept right on doing it until the next person bonded. They texted, they visited, they prepped the wedding, they got all in your business. It was the Jacobson way. And it was awesome. But this time, the protective Jacobson way had just gone a little too far with the grudges, that was all.

  The Watsons and Jacobsons were like oil and water. Everybody knows they don’t mix. But what most people don’t know is that oil will mix with water if you add a little egg yolk. Seth and I were that egg yolk.

  And my family had just learned a hard lesson about grudges and about oil and water and egg yolks and the whole bit. And they were feeling pretty guilty if the looks on their faces were any indication.

  I looked away just as Pablo came back to the front and cleared his throat. “Well, things certainly have gotten exciting, haven’t they? And the excitement isn’t over, I’m afraid. The reason the council convened was because two members from opposite clans have fraternized—”

  “Not true,” I said quietly, but in the vast of the quiet room, I may as well have screamed it. Everyone stopped and looked at me.

  Pablo cocked his eyebrow at me. “The accused can come forward and plead their case now.”

  Plead their case? Is he for real?

  “Each accused may bring a member from their family to help them plead their case.”

  I turned around and shot a glare so hot at Pablo, I didn’t see how he didn’t light on fire right there in that room. He knew that Seth didn’t have any family. We just had this big blowup about his family in this very room in front of him and he was just going to dig the knife in further?

  “It’s all right—” Seth began to ease me, but my mother stopped him by putting her hand on his shoulder.

  “I’ll plead for him.”

  Pablo smiled like he was dealing with a child, while Seth looked at my mother like she hung the freaking moon.

  “Visionary, that’s noble, but—”

  “But he’s my family now. Don’t you dare tell me he’s not.”

  Pablo actually gulped at her tone and looked away. Dad had come to stand beside me. I gripped his arm with one hand and Seth’s with the other. Dad kissed my forehead before I looked to Seth.

  “Let’s begin,” Pablo announced and looked at the council table and then at us. “Let the accused go first.”

  “I guess that means me?” I said angrily, sarcastically.

  “Ava,” Dad scolded in a whisper and exhaled.

  I looked down, shaking my head, and then looked at the council table. “You say that it’s against the law for rival clans to fraternize, but we didn’t. We never even knew each other before we bonded in the coffee shop. So how did we fraternize? God put us together and bonded us. We imprinted. That’s how everyone else in this room found their soulmate. So I can’t see how that’s any different.”

  I squeezed Seth’s hand so I wouldn’t scream.

  He licked his bottom lip before he got started and if we weren’t it this stupid situation I would have thought it was adorable. “Well, just like Ava said, you say it’s rival clans who can’t fraternize, but are the Watsons even a clan anymore? They’re human, they don’t go to reunifications and even if they tried to, would they be welcome? The Watsons used to be a clan of the Virtuoso. But no more. Now they’re just an enemy.”

  The council talked amongst themselves. I looked at Pablo and could see his color rising. Something was amiss. Why did it seem like Pablo wanted this to happen so badly? Why was he so against this?

  Dad took out the cog from his pocket and rubbed it in his fingers. “This isn’t really official family business, but it should be. Our family has done a grave disservice to Seth in the interest of keeping our Ava safe. We need the opportunity to make it up to my daughter’s significant—the signi
ficant that was chosen for her, not by us, but by the same thing that chooses all our soulmates.” He put the cog back in his pocket and looked at Seth, biting his lip as he thought. “I’m so sorry, son.”

  Seth shook his head before Dad was even done. “Like I told Ava, you were protecting her and that’s all I want to do.”

  “Okay, all right,” Pablo spouted and huffed a little. “We can do that later. We need to do the business now. Visionary.” Swung his arm out. “You have the floor.”

  She gave him a long look before looking out at the council. “I believe that ignorance of the law does not dismiss your responsibility of it. However, in this case, when you’re chosen, and a person is imprinted on your heart like we are when our soulmate is found, how is that a crime? It wasn’t something they were looking for. They never once broke a law that we have set out for them. The law says no fraternizing and they had never even met before that day. As for fraternizing now that they’re soulmates and separating them? I can’t even believe that would be up for discussion, and if it is—not just because she’s my daughter, if this was any member of my people—you’ll see a brand new side of me. I can promise you.”

  The chandelier above us began to shake. Seth gripped my arm, pulling me behind him a little, still not used to Mom’s power and still not understanding that it was her that was doing it. Dad slowly made his way over to her.

  “Maggie,” he whispered. “Breathe.”

  “I am breathing,” she said through gritted teeth, so low no one could hear but us.

  He chuckled a little. “No, you’re not.” He gripped her wrist in his hand and took a deep breath, as if he could breathe for her. “Just breathe, baby.” She closed her eyes for a second and then the chandelier stopped its dance. She exhaled and gave him a look. “I know,” he soothed and put his forehead against hers, letting his nose rub hers. “Everything will be okay.”

  I looked over at the council to see how they were taking in all this. They still just tittered away. Seth was looking at my parents like they were aliens. I reached up and pulled his face over to look at me like he had done to me so many times. He looked scared for us and a little slap happy.

  “And so in love with you,” he added and pulled me to him, his hands on the backs on my hips. “It doesn’t matter what they say,” he whispered and leaned in. “Remember what I told you? No one—family, friend, or foe—is taking you away from me. If we had to run…” He stopped and waited for my answer to the dot, dot, dot.

  “Then we’d be okay,” I said quickly, quietly.

  He shook his head and laughed once with no humor, at all. “All this for my last name that they gave me, because they kidnapped me and kept me all these years. A last name that I don’t even want anymore.”

  He hadn’t realized how loud he’d gotten until the middle council member stood. She was from the Petrona clan. She looked to her left and then to her right down the line of councilors and then at us before she said, “The accused will not be deunified,” my family started shouting and hooting, “or punished in any way. Majority rules. Case closed.”

  Before I could even turn to face him, Seth was grabbing me, lifting me up and kissing me. This was not a brushing of the lips, no. His arms were tight around my stomach and his lips made all my aches go away. He swung me around I didn’t know how many times. I wasn’t counting, I was just focusing on his lips.

  “Well,” Pablo shouted over the ruckus. “I guess we have it all cinched up, now don’t we. Now that this ridiculous business is done, I want to dance with my wife.” He clapped his hands. “Everyone get to first position for the Theoli dance.”

  “The what dance?” Seth laughed as he set me back to my feet.

  “It’s a customary dance we all learned from going to the reunifications every year.” I screwed up my lips. “But you wouldn’t know that because you’ve never been. They do all sorts of things at the reunifications that you’re probably going to think is a little cuckoo.” I laughed a little. “It’s really just one big party with folk dances and games, but they’re all organized and kinda…weird. But fun.”

  He watched them as they got into place in the middle of the room. “And you all know these dances. Every single one of you.” He smiled at me. “Everyone except me.” His smile got sadder, whether he knew it or not. “You know all the games, all the ins and outs of everything and I’ll always be a step behind because they took me from my mother.” He huffed. “And even if they hadn’t taken me from my mother, I still would be a step behind you because I would have grown up completely human, with no knowledge of this world at all.” He looked down, his sad little smile in place.

  I gripped him around his waist, looking up and catching his gaze. Once we were locked in place I took one of his hands and put it on my side. The other hand, I took in mine, holding it.

  “Now we dance,” I told him and started to sway back and forth. I bit my lip at the intensity of looking into his eyes. He made a rumbling sound and used the hand on my side to pull me closer. It was so rushed that I gasped a little from the move. His smile morphed into a smirk and I wanted to scream in triumph.

  There it is.

  What’s that, beautiful?

  He knew exactly what I meant.

  Your smirk that I miss so much.

  He chuckled. You like my smirk? Why’s that?

  Because it means that you’re the happiest. He tilted his head. When you’re joking and playing, you’re so happy. And I want you to always be the happiest.

  Sweetheart, you have no idea how happy you make me if you think that the only time I’m happy is when I make a stupid gesture with my lips. He pulled me up as he came down and leaned his forehead to mine. That’s the only reason I was worried about our plan not working with my family. Because they’ll see how happy I am.

  I sighed, biting my lip, happy for now. Okay. Just dance with me.

  You stop biting that lip and show me the steps.

  He looked at everyone in the middle of the room, doing the Theoli and he looked like he could throw up.

  I’ll show you the steps.

  I started to sway my hips again, moving my feet, and put my head on his chest. “See, it’s easy.”

  “No one else is slow dancing, Ave,” he stated the obvious.

  I lifted my head. “We’re oil and water and we’re never going to mix with the rest of our kind. We may as well just accept that. They do a jig, oil and water slow dances.”

  He chuckled into my hair before kissing my hairline. “Thank you,” he said gratefully. “But you don’t always have to be oil and water for me. Sometimes we can do the jig.”

  I smiled up at him and bit my lip just for his benefit. “Sometimes we will. But not today.”

  Seventeen

  “So, tonight when I go to sleep, you’re going to see me again, my subconscious?”

  He rubbed his scruffy chin against my cheekbone as he hummed a, “Mmhmm,” and took another gulp of his tea, turning some music on with his phone. “All You Wanted” by Sounds Under Radio began to play as I looked up at the stars. The night was so clear it was kind of ridiculous. We sat in one of Mom’s big green Adirondack chairs in the back yard. Seth had lit the fire pit—you know, firemen and their fire. He couldn’t help himself. And Mom, Dad, and Rodney had come out here and we’d just sat together. Eventually Ember, Drake, Maria, Dawson, Jordan, and Laurelyn made their way over after the summit and we sat out there for hours. Dad eventually broke out the grill and hotdogs, and we made a night of it.

  But now, way past midnight, everyone was gone, the night was so still I could feel every breath Seth took and hear every rustle of the leaves, we just sat there together in the chair, me on his lap, and I waited for a shooting star. I was sure that wasn’t what Seth was doing, but as I listened to him speak, soaking his voice into my skin as his spoke against my temple, I waited for one. I figured we deserved one after the hell the universe had put us through.

  Seth chuckled a little. “In the beginning, y
ou were so different in your dreams. You hated me in real life and in your dreams, we had just bonded and that was it. You didn’t understand why the real you would be angry with me.” I couldn’t see his smile, but heard it. “It was strange, but amazing to get these two sides of you. And then you started telling me all these things about you.” I gasped and looked at him over my shoulder.

  “The blueberry bagel with blueberry cream cheese!”

  He grinned. “It was her—your idea. I told you I wanted to learn you and you started spouting all these random things about yourself.” He chuckled again. “That wasn’t really what I had in mind, but you said if it seemed like I was figuring you out, like I was trying, that your stubborn side would smooth over.”

  I scrunched my nose at him with a smile and laid back down. “I can’t believe I would say that about myself.”

  “The dream you is very rational.”

  “She sounds like a goody two shoes,” I spouted back.

  He laughed and squeezed his arms around me tighter. “She learned that from you.”

  “Pfft,” I scoffed and settled in deeper, my eyes never leaving the skies, even in our bantering. “So the coffee, the bagels, the art, the…songs,” I realized and whispered. “You learned all that from me.”

  “We wanted us to work,” he said into the skin just under my jaw. “You wanted us to work so badly.”

  I felt my breath stutter in my chest as it fought its way out. “Ahh...”

  “What, baby?” He sat up a little, and turned my face over my shoulder so he could see me. “Ava.”

  “You did all this…for me. You came to my dreams to find me.” His brow lowered. “I wouldn’t connect to you here, so you went to my dreams hoping that it would somehow be different there, that it would be easier for me.”

  His lip curled and he shook his head. “Don’t give me too much credit, now. I wanted to find you because I needed you. Wanted you.”