“Of course you would. You’re always studying her in ways you shouldn’t. She’s a sweet girl, and doesn’t need you staring at her legs.”
Kerdik’s voice turned sharper. “She’s far too pale. Does she need more blood? Her father’s donation clearly wasn’t enough.” I heard a rustle of material, and then a grave, “Use mine. I have far more magic than Urien. It’ll heal her faster. Plus, it’ll seal her against the Sluaghs coming to look for her again. They won’t be able to steal her spirit if I seal it inside of her.”
“But... I… To use your blood? That’s a little over my head. There’s so much mystery to you involved; there’s no telling what it’ll do to her. Where’s my parchment? I have to tell him of the risks.”
I drifted back to sleep, unable to fend off unconsciousness for too long. My world was a tornado of black and grey, swirling with pinpricks of stars the moment something sharp bit at my arm. The stars grew brighter, and somehow seemed loud, like I could not only see them, but hear their brilliance that sparkled in my ears. My senses felt like they were scrambling, tilting me and pushing something powerful through my lungs that I couldn’t quite harness with any kind of certainty. The friction of the charge led to heat that threatened my cellular makeup on a level I couldn’t compute. The surge left a trail of miniature explosions as it burned through my veins, changing atoms and altering things that were best left alone. I hadn’t known this was what death would feel like. In truth, I assumed I was too stubborn to die, but perhaps that was my foolishness poking through.
I felt my throat scrape raw, and realized that my body must be screaming. I felt so removed from my skin that I couldn’t connect the convulsing I knew my body was doing to my mind. The only thing I could hear was the sparkle of the stars, and boy, did they have a tune to rival the actual Britney Spears. They were so glorious that I couldn’t focus on anything else – even the pain I was sure was there.
Then somehow I was the stars, teeming with them until they flew into my skin, like I was a magnet for the most brilliant of beauties. My body felt like it was glowing from the inside out, my cells heating and whirling with a force I was unfamiliar with.
A delicious heat started in my left eye, and then spread out through my face. It ran like a line of too-warm chocolate over each of the claw marks that had left me disfigured and barely alive. I knew my body was convulsing as my heart started to give up the fight, but as the light and heat spread through me, I didn’t care. I was a star, twinkling and shining above the pain and the fear of the unknown. If my afterlife would be spent as a star, looking down at the world with a brilliance to light the way, I would take it.
The warmth moved over my chest and through it, doing something to my lungs that gave them more air, like a balloon that inflated too quickly. The heat bowled through my veins, rolling down my arteries and filling them with that same melty chocolate. It all felt like a surreal dream I couldn’t quite get ahold of. On and on it churned through my body, until it seemed every part of me was brimming with warmth and gooey deliciousness.
The agony of dying was finally passing, and now I was in limbo, resting from the torment Faîte had put me through.
The star that morphed with me twinkled, turning its brightness up to a decibel that finally grew too painful for me to stand. One last scream erupted from me, and then I knew nothing, felt nothing, and was blissfully nothing.
23
Dead with Kerdik
The arms around me were comforting and warm. The scent of grass, daisies and roses greeted me, wrapping me in the closeness of a haven I thought I might never feel again. The muscles were firm, though not as broad and gratuitously beefy as Bastien’s. I wondered where my boyfriend was, and if he was looking for me, or if he was still out slaying dragons.
My hand dragged up the fabric of Kerdik’s pressed shirt, clumsily clutching at the nuances of his pectoral muscles to make sure he was real. “Darling? Rosie, are you awake? Did it work?”
My eyelids felt heavy with too many burdens when they finally opened. We were on a raised wooden bedframe, but there was thick, soft grass where the mattress should have been. My gaze widened, and I saw that we were on our nature bed in the middle of a meadow, surrounded by millions and millions of daisies and roses that boasted every color of the rainbow. The sun shone down on us, warming our skin, but not blinding me with its brilliance.
“Water?” I rasped, unsure where I was at in this new afterlife.
“Of course, love. Let me just move you up a little. There you go.” He shifted against the wooden headboard of the bed that wasn’t mine, and cupped his hand to my lips, angling it downward as water welled in his palm. The trickle into my throat felt amazing, cooling me and refreshing too many weary things to count.
I swallowed over and over until my stomach protested. “Oh, that was amazing. Thanks, K.” I looked up at his face, which was gazing on me with a mixture of devotion and wariness. My body didn’t feel sturdy enough to sit up on my own. I felt oddly boneless, so I stayed tucked in Kerdik’s embrace, my cheek resting on his shoulder, his body soothing mine as his chest moved steadily up and down. I pursed my lips, afraid the peace of the moment was too unrealistic to trust. “Which parts of it all were real? Am I… Are we dead?”
“Do you feel dead?”
I looked down and saw that my legs were perfect – without even the scar from when Remy had sliced the snakes out of my thigh. My skin looked different, though. Instead of my usual tan, the flesh was lighter, with a peachy glow that seemed too creamy and reflective to be real. I nodded slowly. “I think this is dead. My skin’s practically shining. That’s not what my body looks like.” I listened for any nearby voices, but couldn’t make out so much as a bird. “I can’t hear anyone. Usually I can pick out something, but it’s just us. This is… Yeah, this is dead. I can’t even hear any animals.” I studied the flowers, fascinated that this was where I’d ended up. I’d never given much thought to the afterlife, but if this was it, I wasn’t about to complain. “Wow. I must’ve done something good to end up here. So pretty.”
Kerdik’s free hand rested on my bare knee, drawing attention to the fact that I was wearing one of my cotton strappy nightgowns. This one was white, and added to the glow of my new afterlife peachy skin, increasing the Heavenly ambiance.
“Bastien’s alive, then? And Dad and Link? They survived?”
“They did.”
I looked around again, and the way my neck moved, it felt like my head was floating. Kerdik and I had died together – it was the only way to explain how we’d ended up here, alone in Heaven while the world was still in turmoil. “Did it hurt when you died? Mine was a lot of pain.”
His eyebrows pushed together. “Are you in pain now?”
“No. I don’t think so. I feel… is this what being high feels like? I don’t totally know what’s happening here.”
“What would you like to have happen?”
I considered this, but soon my brain started to strain with answers that were stacked on top of more questions. “Too many things,” I replied simply. My lashes fluttered shut as I gave up on figuring the afterlife out just yet. I leaned back into Kerdik’s shoulder, snuggling up to his long body and pulling my knees up so I could be as close as possible.
His fingers trailed from my knee down the slope of my unmarked calf and swirled on my big toe, giving it a playful little tug. “Can you feel that?”
“Mm-hm,” I answered dreamily. “Feels like you love me.”
I could hear the smile in his reply. “Indeed, I do. I never thought I would do for anyone what I did to try and save you. I didn’t realize how much I truly loved you until I thought I might lose you forever.”
“Whatever you did to try and save me must be what killed you. Kerdik, I’m so sorry.” The words sounded trite, but I couldn’t think in a straight line with all this newness swirling in my brain.
“Don’t think on it,” he whispered like a promise that everything would be alright.
I tried not to dwell on all the awful ramifications of being dead. “Do you think we’ll have each other forever?”
“I think we already do. You should know better than to mark people so permanently. At this rate, I’ll never be able to shake the affection I have for you.” His fingers trailed back up my calf and drew a lazy circle on my knee. “I’m sorry it took me so long to come when you called.”
I shrugged. “I’m dead now. What do I care? Let’s just be here for a few before we crash into the mountains of regret. I can’t process it right now. I’ll be too sad about all the people I love that are left behind.”
“Then what shall we talk about?”
My lips pursed and drew to the side in thought. “What are you most looking forward to, now that you can do anything without worrying about how it affects the world?”
Kerdik chuckled. “That you think I concern myself with the daily woes of Avalon shows how little you know me.” He considered my question, and then spoke his confession quietly. “If I couldn’t hurt anyone, I would strip you naked and make love to you. If there was no fear of you turning into a…” He cleared his throat. “I would pledge my body to yours over and over until mine was the only name in your heart.” His thumb trailed over the outline of my face just to feel the texture of my impossibly smooth skin. It wasn’t from Jean-Luc sewing me up, but whole new flesh that was velvety to the touch.
My eyes widened and my jaw dropped. “Wow. I wasn’t expecting such an honest answer. I was thinking more along the lines of you wearing women’s underwear while lighting off illegal fireworks or something.”
“I much prefer the fire we make together.”
I snuggled more firmly into him, pressing into the wound he probably didn’t want me to know was there. “Roland told me about Tara. You fell in love with her and had sex, but it turned her into a sea monster-dragon. Then she killed herself in the ocean. I’m so sorry.”
Kerdik’s eyes tightened. “Then you know of my curse?”
I nodded slowly, hoping he wouldn’t snap at me.
“You know, and yet you’re still in my arms.”
My heart hammered in my chest when he traced his finger along my lower lip. Our eyes locked in on each other’s, counting the irregular heartbeats that banged through my body. Something shifted, as it always did with us.
I was dead, and so was Kerdik.
He snuck his finger past my lips, gazing at me hungrily as my mouth closed around his finger. My tongue laved around his digit, sucking with just enough force to watch his eyes roll back. Bastien was alive, and I was very much dead. As much as I knew that would hit me hard all too soon, I was determined to enjoy the serenity of the moment. My fingers reached up and stroked along the edge of his angular jaw, feathering the green silky skin that always fascinated me.
When he lowered his lips to mine, my heart fluttered with all the fervency of a hummingbird’s wings. Our other stolen kisses had either been accidents or fits of frustration, but this one was true and intentional. We both wanted this one. Perhaps we wanted too much for Faîte to be merciful, but it was our chance, so we took it.
24
On Our Bed of Grass
The kiss started out slow and beautiful. Kerdik was careful with me, fingering the edge of my face as if I was made of glass. I didn’t often feel graceful, but his feather-light touch made my body stretch like a ballerina’s. My neck elongated so he could trickle his touch down my throat. My back arched when his arm coiled more firmly around my waist. I felt precious in his arms, and sucked on his lower lip when he made to pull away. I didn’t want the kiss to end just yet. After dying by being ripped apart by a hoard of peludas, I wanted to feel like a dancer. My skin was glowing without a single scar to remind me that life had ended so unkindly.
My hand buried itself in the hair at the back of his head. My fingers tangled in the soft, short blue, frustrating the zig-zag part down the side. I gave a slight tug that made him deepen the kiss, his tongue sneaking past my lips to mingle with mine. My hand drifted of its own accord to the collar of his white pressed shirt, fiddling idly with the top button until it popped open for me.
Kerdik pulled back, his eyes wide as he took in my daring that was tinged with a brush of bashfulness. “I… You want…”
I shrugged. “I’m dead. What’s the point of self-control? This is the first time I’ve felt beautiful in too long.”
He inhaled at my logic, and then leaned in to kiss me again, leaving me breathless before he pulled away. He sat us both up straight, and turned my body around so my back was pressed to his chest, explaining with a reminder of, “The fire. I don’t want my only shirt singed.”
“Oh, right. That’s still coming.” I waited for the belch to build in my esophagus, but after half a minute of patience, it never came. “Huh. I mean, I don’t feel like I need to breathe fire. Maybe being dead got rid of that little tick.” I stood up and hopped off the bed. It was a glorious feeling to stretch my arms over my head, digging my toes in the grass. I leaned down to pick a daisy from the green, and set to work braiding the stem into my hair. Braiding my hair and picking flowers would be my new job.
Kerdik watched me with concern, but I couldn’t have felt more like a hippie love child if I tried. I was wearing a pure white nightgown that kind of looked like a sundress, standing in a field of flowers with a nature bed smack in the middle of the perfect scene. If this was dead, I’d be sad about it tomorrow. The sun was too deliciously warm for complaining. There were no peludas here. After having my face nearly clawed off, dead didn’t feel too bad a place if I could see out of both eyes, and could walk without issue.
“I don’t understand,” Kerdik admitted, his eyebrows pushed together. “You should be breathing fire by now.”
I braided a second flower into my curls, that I could tell had been washed recently. “Sorry to disappoint. Maybe you should kiss me again. And again, and again, and again.” I smiled at him and waved for my friend to join me. “We’re dead, K. I don’t think this world has the same rules or consequences. If I’m my biggest adventure, then this is what I want to do at the finish line of it all.”
Kerdik rose slowly, his eyes suddenly hungry as he took in my form. He cleared the gap between us in two long steps, laying one on me as he cupped my face. My knees went weak with the passion that didn’t bother with politeness. Our lips made a perfect mess of our friendship, and then our tongues followed the bad example. After trying to please my parents, Bastien, and Avalon, doing the wrong thing tasted like peppermints and sheer deliciousness.
Kerdik had always been the treat I wasn’t allowed to savor.
“Closer,” he panted. “I need more.” He clutched my hips, so I went with the moment and jumped up into his arms, wrapping my legs around his waist. I sucked his grunt of surprise and longing into my mouth, taking his gasp and making it my own. His left hand wandered into no man’s land, giving my round rear a luscious squeeze. “More,” he breathed.
He carried me to the bed and dumped me there, grabbing hold of my foot so he could rub sweetness into the sole while I stretched on the green of the grass mattress. I moaned pornographically at the steady pressure of the massage, my body going from live wire to limp in a matter of seconds. Kerdik’s mouth was in a tight line, and I could practically feel the lust radiating off him when my nightgown slipped up my leg a few inches.
I’d been the ugly girl my whole life. I mean, no man in Common had looked at me as if I was beautiful, much less sexy. The heated look in Kerdik’s eyes was the way every girl wishes she could make a man lust for her. The ugly girl who was still inside of me high-fived the vixen in bed, and told her to make the most of the opportunity she’d never had.
Then suddenly, Kerdik dropped my foot and backed away, his wide eyes wary with caution, looking at me like I was a danger to him. “You’ll not tempt me further with things we simply cannot do.”
“Hello, you’re the one who kissed me like Ian Somerhalder on a mission, and then gra
bbed my butt.” I sat up and studied his expression, trying my best to put my libido on hold. “What’s wrong, K? If I’m not breathing fire, then who’s to say we can’t enjoy this?”
His expression closed off, but then dipped back into the land of lust. “I don’t know, Rosie.”
I sat up, frowning. “Well, if you don’t know, that’s alright, but you probably shouldn’t kiss me like that until you do.”
“Yes, well, perhaps I’m tempting myself with forbidden fruit.” He took tentative steps toward the mattress, leaning over and kissing me lightly, but with a dark intent that made my blood race. Kerdik tipped me back onto the green, grassy bed and climbed up my body, resting his hands on either side of my head. He parted my knees and pressed his hips down onto mine, taking our weird friendship past the hazy boundary and planting it square where it might never return from. His whisper in my ear made my body react against his, writhing when I should’ve stayed still. “I know exactly what to do with a ripe piece of fruit.” He kissed my chin, then my throat, then my collarbone as I fisted the grass, tearing it out by the roots. “So sweet. It would be delicious if we fell.” He slid the strap off my shoulder with one of his dexterous hands, studying my body that, in death, had absolutely no self-control.
One quick tug, and our friendship would take a back burner to the passion that blazed just beneath the surface. He left me in limbo to squirm while he moved over my torso, nipping at me through the fabric in all the right, and oh-so-wrong places.
“I could tease you like this for an eternity,” he said as he gripped my thighs.
Something in his words pinged reality into my hazy brain. “Wait, you’re immortal. I get how I’m dead, but how are you dead?”
Kerdik’s face lifted from his conquest, quirking an eyebrow at me. “That’s what you’re thinking about? I’ve got you inches away from naked, and that’s where your mind is at? Perhaps I am rusty.”
Broken Girl Page 14
