by H G Lynch
A trembling, fragile smile formed on Reid’s lips and he laughed shakily, his shoulders slumping in what seemed to be relief. “Ember, you…you…” He took her hands and pressed them to his mouth, kissing her knuckles. She started in surprise, and was even more surprised to feel her eyes stinging. It was strange to see Reid so upset. He hadn’t looked like that since the night he’d gotten captured by The Society. She felt like she was missing something here….then a horrible thought struck her and her breath stuck in her chest.
Her voice came out strangled as she said, “Is…is Sherry okay? She was in the car with me, she was driving, and then…then we crashed and she…I pulled her out, but I don’t…I can’t remember what…” She couldn’t form a coherent sentence, her chest was painfully tight and her brain was throwing sparks.
“Sherry’s fine. She’s fine. Hiro got her out pretty quick. But Ember…you…” Reid was staring at her so intensely that she thought he was seeing right down to her soul, and her heart spluttered. It had been a while since he’d looked at her that way. She’d forgotten what it felt like, to see his eyes clear of guilt and shame. Now there was only pain and love, and it looked like they were tearing him apart. He raised a hand to her face to brush back her hair, and his skin felt warm. She lifted her own hand to hold his against her cheek, relaxing into the warmth and the familiar spiced-apple smell of his skin. Reid made a soft sound and leaned his forehead against hers, his breath lingering on her lips. It didn’t matter that she was still mad at him, because she knew without asking that it was him who’d saved her life. Again.
“Thank you,” she murmured, meaning it.
Lightly, Reid’s fingers traced her lips and he shook his head, trailing his free hand down to her chest and placing it flat over her heart. Very, very gingerly, he pressed his mouth to hers for a single heartbeat and she tasted salt. She couldn’t tell if it was from her tears or his. Her chest ached, and she wasn’t sure if it was from the crash or from feeling Reid shaking like a freezing puppy. What was she missing? Something very bad had happened and he wasn’t telling her.
“Reid, what happened?” she asked quietly.
For a long moment, Reid was silent. Ember sat back and opened her eyes to look at him, and found he was staring at his own hand spread on her chest. His expression was bleak, his mouth tilted down at the corners. “Ember,” he said softly, his voice rough, “You died. Your heart…it stopped beating. You were technically dead for…God, I don’t even know how long. Too long. Ember, you were dead.” His voice cracked and he got off the bed suddenly, going to the window with his back to her. He swiped his hands over his face and drew in a deep breath. The line of his shoulders was straight, tense, his hands curling into fists at his sides. His head was bowed and he raised one hand to rest a fist on the clear glass of the window. He cursed under his breath and she saw him shudder.
Ember stared at his back, unsure what to do or say. She heard his words but they didn’t mean anything to her. She’d died. She’d been dead, no pulse, no heartbeat, no breathing. But she was still here. Her heart was beating now; she could feel it in her chest. She could feel every breath burning in her lungs. But this time hadn’t been just a close call with Death…she’d shaken Death’s cold hand and then waved him goodbye. It was a scary thought. And it explained why Reid was so distressed. She remembered how it felt when he’d gotten staked and she’d thought he might die. How would it feel to him to have her actually die in his arms? She couldn’t imagine.
Carefully, she slid out of the bed and padded across the floor to him slowly. Her legs trembled and she stumbled, gasping as her knees gave out under her. Reid caught her before she got anywhere near the floor, his arms wrapping around her. His breath was hot in her ear as he muttered, “You need to learn to take care of yourself, Emz. You shouldn’t get out of bed.” His lips brushed her neck, soft and warm. Her teeth tingled in response. She was still so thirsty, but the thirst was transforming. She didn’t want coke anymore, she wanted blood. Tipping her chin up, she kissed his throat gently, tasting his skin, feeling his pulse against her lips. She began to peel her lips back from her teeth, her fangs lazily extending…
And Reid swept her into his arms and dropped her onto the bed quickly. She pouted when he took a step back from the bed, lifting his fingers to his throat as if he knew what she’d been thinking. He gave her a knowing look and moved his hand to his mouth before biting into his wrist. Bringing his arm down to her, sitting on the bed next to her, he shook his head. “You know how much you’ve had in the last three days? Me and Sherry and Ricky have been giving you transfusions. Cris wanted to help but we weren’t sure what his blood would do to you, and Hiro said his blood would probably kill you,” he said as she snatched his wrist. She had his wrist right against her lips before she realized what he’d said and then paused, staring at him in shock.
“Three days? I…I’ve been out for three days?” she asked, incredulous. How could she have been asleep for three whole days? It felt like she’d been asleep for hours, not days. What had she missed in those three days? Had Lia taken over the world yet? Thinking of Lia reminded her of the dream she’d had, the one that told her that Liandra was the siren. She turned urgent eyes on Reid. “Reid, there’s something about Lia! She’s—”
He shook his head and pressed his wrist closer to her mouth, red lines running over his pale skin. “Don’t you mind about Lia. Drink. Drink and then we can talk,” he insisted.
“But–”
“No buts. Drink.”
It was frustratingly impossible to argue with Reid when he got protective like this, so she sighed and gave up. Her fangs were aching anyway, so she bit into his wrist and warm blood flooded her mouth, soothing the rawness of her throat as it trickled down to her stomach. Heat spread through her veins, banishing the lingering effects of the nearly-drowning. Her head stopped thumping and she felt like she could breathe again, but the warmth made her sleepy and she dropped Reid’s wrist to lean back against her pillows. He smiled gently at her, his blue eyes bright, and touched her mouth, swiping away the blood on her lips with his thumb.
Her eyes fluttered closed and she was almost asleep when she heard Reid murmur softly in her ear, “I can’t believe I could have lost you, firefly. I don’t want to ever lose you.”
*****
Reid was gone when Ember woke up again. Blinking slowly, she sat up and frowned, holding a hand to her head which felt like it was full of cotton wool. On the other bed, Sherry was sitting reading by the light of the bedside lamp, but she looked up when Ember started to crawl out of her bed.
Tossing her book down, Sherry slid off her bed to help Ember get to her feet. “Oh, thank god you’re awake. I’m so sorry, Emz, I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened! One minute I was driving and laughing, and then…then I can’t remember. I can’t remember anything after that until I woke up in the car and we were in the water and-and…” Sherry’s green eyes were wide and shimmering with unshed tears, and Ember shook off her fluttering attempts to help her.
“I’m fine, Sherz. I can stand on my own, you know. And it’s okay, it wasn’t your fault. It was Lia’s.” Ember hadn’t meant say that and she bit her lip as soon as the words were out. Whoops. She’d meant to say it was the siren’s fault, not Lia’s…but Lia was the siren and she supposed Sherry needed to know. She’d find out sooner or later anyway.
Distractedly, Ember crawled under her bed to get her coke, waiting for Sherry to say something. When she surfaced from under the dusty depths of her bed, she turned and looked up at Sherry with an eyebrow arched expectantly. Much to her surprise, Sherry looked angry, angrier than Ember had ever seen her. “Uh, Sherz? Come on, you know it’s true, right? It makes sense.”
Her green eyes flashed. “Oh, shut up, Ember! You’re just pissed off and jealous because we’ve all been spending time with Lia! Because she’s nice and fun and normal and we all like her. The only reason you don’t like her is because you’re a paranoid brat, and you can’t
stand the idea that I might be friends with someone else. You hate her because she flirts with Reid, and you’re so damn insecure that you just expect him to go off with her, even though you know he loves you! How about you grow up and stop blaming Lia for your friggin’ paranoia!”
Ember was speechless for a long moment, stunned by Sherry’s harshness. It wasn’t like her to say things like that, not even when she was angry. But Ember had another card to play, one that would shut Sherry right up. “There’s nothing normal about Lia! She’s a supernatural bitch! She’s the siren in the lake, Sherry! It’s her! I know it is! It makes sense. It’s why you all like her so damn much, it’s why she was able to make Reid kiss her, it’s why Reid was the only one able to get through the wardings on the lake – because she made them that way! She probably got his hair sometime right after we met her and wove it into the wards so he’d be immune to them. She’s been after him from the word go and that’s your proof! She’s a man-stealing murderous monster and she needs to be killed.”
Sighing, all the anger suddenly drained from her face, Sherry sighed. There was something like pity in her eyes. "Lia is human! Like I used to be! Like you used to be...You know, I never really understood why you hated people so much, why you snubbed everyone as if they were beneath you, but now I understand. You were just born to be like this. You were always meant to be something inhuman."
For a long, long time, Ember just stared at her. Then she turned on her heel and walked out of the room, slamming the door behind her. Fine. If she won’t believe me, Reid will. He has to.
*****
** Reid **
Reid was at Onyx Lake, staring out at the still water. He just couldn’t figure this one out. There was a siren in that lake, he knew, but he didn’t understand the siren’s motives. Three times, it had tried to drown Ember, and only Ember. The car crash, he was certain, was a targeted attack on Ember, and Sherry had just gotten in the crosshairs. But why was it so hell-bent on killing Ember? Why Ember, what had she done? He thought he knew the answer, but he didn’t like it: It was because Ember was his girlfriend. She was his, and he was hers, so she had to go because the siren had a thing for him. That was why he could get through the wardings. The siren wanted him. It wasn’t like a siren to want a specific partner, but this one had seen him somewhere and decided he was the one she wanted. That was why she’d been killing the other boys. They were just distractions, or maybe she’d killed them to get his attention, to get him to the lake. It didn’t matter. What mattered was finding the siren and getting rid of her somehow. Brandon had suggested they strip her magic, take away the part of her that let her control the water and mess with peoples’ heads. If they did that, she’d be as good as dead. Sirens needed that connection to the water to survive. Without it, they effectively suffocated if they spent more than five minutes out of water, like a fish.
While he was thinking, frowning, his ears picked up a sudden whisper of sound. It was that phantom music, the melodic sound that had entranced him into walking into the lake the day the wardings had been reversed and coated the water in ice. He tried not to listen, tried to clamp his hands over his ears, but it was inside his skull…
That sweet singing, the sound of silver chimes and tinkling crystal and a babbling brook. The flowing, tantalizing words of a half-heard dream, of another language with such beauty as he'd never heard before. It called to him, beckoned him. Some deep, buried part of him understood what that melodious voice wanted, and he was helpless but to obey it. The tinkling music rippled through him, like clear blood in his veins, like water itself. Following the beautiful music, obeying the chanting without understanding it, Reid pulled off his t-shirt and dropped it to the grass. He reached for the button of his jeans, in an instant, they fell to a pile of denim at his feet.
The sweet music continued to curl around him, embracing him like tender arms. He finished stripping off, and at last, was wearing nothing but the haunting, irresistible music that wrapped around him. His skin prickled in response to the freezing wind. Even with vampire resistance, it was a little cold.
The singing voice rose higher, beckoning him to the water. He strode to the water's edge, and hovered there, hesitating. There was a tiny voice whispering in the back of his mind, but whatever it was saying, he couldn't hear it over the magical singing. Giving in to the liquid music, he stepped into the water. An intense chill engulfed his foot, but the iciness of the water dropped away so that all he could focus on was the singing. The beautiful singing.
He took another step, and another, and another, until the water was halfway up his thighs. The water clung to his skin, slipping around him and immersing him in sensual fingers of liquid. The music continued, drawing him deeper, winding itself into the permanent recesses of his mind, snaking its way through his body. He walked further into the water, unable to control the music's pull on him as it sucked him in. The echoing, crystalline voice surrounded him, coming from every direction, rising up from the water and out of the rocks like the earth itself was singing to him. Up to his waist in water, Reid paused, feeling the water around him. It stroked him, caressed his skin, felt every line of his body and brushed him with silken warmth like melted gold. In the very back of his mind, he knew logically that the water he was standing in was freezing cold, cold enough to induce hypothermia in a human, cold enough to give even a vampire a sheen of frost. But his body didn't feel it, his body was convinced the water was warm and it was moving around him like a living thing, touching his skin with seductive tingles.
Enthralled by the music, entranced by the water, he reached out his fingertips to the water's surface, and stroked the ripples. The water hummed with life at the smooth touch of his fingertips. He could feel it, the water was truly alive with the crystal singing. Something brushed his legs, smooth and soft, and he looked down. The water was clear enough, but he couldn't clearly see anything there. Just a blur of creamy bubbles that washed past him under the surface. He felt it again, something touching him with delicate fingers, soothing strokes. It sent delicious shivers down his spine, tingles through his body. The touch came again, lightly fingering the muscles in his back. It swam around him, teasing touches of sweet water, while the music went on and on, rising and falling in such perfect pitch, capturing his every sense. The trees around him seemed filled with the lovely music, the bare branches swaying in time to the rhythm, the grass and roots under the earth reaching for the water. The wind whispered through the rocks, across the water surface, joining the natural orchestra.
And then, all of a sudden, the music quieted. It dropped away to a delicate, tinkling breath in the wind, coming from only one direction. Desperate to reclaim the haunting melody, the beauty of the water and its sensual touch, he followed the whispering of the singing. Followed it deeper and deeper into the lake, all the way to the furthest shore, where the cliff of rock rose up before him. The shallow alcoves and lines of green moss that ran across the brown rock like precious veins of gold held a mystery for him that had not been there before now. The music seemed to be coming from within the rock...No, the wind had changed. The singing was coming toward him from behind now. He turned, his eyes scanning the treeline, the edges of the water, hoping to glimpse whatever incredible creature was making this music. Then he spotted it, just a handful of feet away from him, the silvery glint of something as it dove under the surface.
He moved toward it quickly, stopping in the spot where the glint had vanished, and looked around. There it was again, just to his left. He turned. It was gone. Something shimmered in the corner of his eye, and he spun again, in time to see the creamy silver flash disappear under the water once more. The whispering music continued to tease him, the brief glints of silver that seemed to melt away whenever he tried to look at them directly were maddening him.
Then, something began to rise from the water in front of him, something pale and ethereal that seemed to shimmer like the water itself in moonlight. Slowly, it took shape, the clear water running off it l
ike streams of liquid crystal. The music flooded back to him, ringing in his ears like sweet chimes as the pale form before him took on the shape of a figure. Slender arms tipped with smooth hands, a graceful, bowed neck. Skin like rose petals stretched softly over slight shoulder blades, a curving spine, a small waist from which luscious hips flared out. Hair the color of grass in sunlight spilled down like a sheet of wet silk, reaching half-way down the girl's back.
Slowly, the girl turned, and Reid saw, without shock but with plenty of awe, that Liandra stood before him. Her skin shone like pearls, her hazel eyes were wide and deep and swirling with sensual light. Her lips were curled in a laughing smile, though all Reid could hear was the singing. Lia was naked, dripping wet, her hair falling to cover her breasts, the water swishing around her navel like ribbons of translucent mercury.
Amazed, Reid could only stare, his every sense telling him that this girl was everything could ever imagine wanting. The singing voice that echoed around him told him that her skin would be warm and soft, her touch delicate as spun silk, her breath on his skin light as the kiss of a feather, her lips on his as sweet as honey. She was beautiful and mesmerizing, temptation in the most seductive form. She stepped toward him, and he held himself still. She stepped again, and his skin prickled at her closeness. He could feel the heat of her body, smell the intoxicating scent of her skin and hair, see the chips of grey and green in her eyes. His heart raced, bursts of electricity flying through his nerves from nowhere to nowhere. Shivers ran over his skin like shingle sliding down a beach. He'd never felt like this before, never been so enthralled or so intoxicated by one girl, never imagined how sweet it could feel to have the ultimate temptation before him.
Lia reached out and pressed her fingertips to his bare chest. It was all he could not to pull her to him and kiss her like he'd never kissed anyone else. His every nerve screamed at him to do just that, but he held himself back. There was something...something he had to remember...some niggling feeling pressing in at the back of his mind...
