Defiant Destiny

by Madison Cumbee

  “When do you think that will be?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know.”

  We were silent for several more minutes and then Keira sighed and asked me hopefully, “Is there another legend?”

  “Yes.” I racked my brain for a somewhat cheerful and interesting couple of years that the guild spent in acclamation. Then I got one. “How’s King Arthur and the knights of the round table sound?”

  “Like a bold-faced lie,” Keira’s voice was stronger.

  “It’s not.”

  “Seriously?”

  “We still gather around round tables today.” I tried a small smile.

  Keira reciprocated it. “Like the one in your backyard?”

  “Exactly. That is our allotted place of meeting to discuss our missions in High Point.”

  “Which legendary mailed man were you?”

  “Lancelot.”

  “Ooh, don’t tease. Who’s Arthur?”

  “Azra.”

  “And Odeda his Guinevere?”

  “Yes.”

  Thankfully, she seemed to be almost all the way back to enjoying herself. Another attribute we share- when we know there is nothing we can do about a situation we aren’t happy with, we do our best to not dwell on it. I was getting better at that- not dwelling- the more time I spent with my girl. She asked me, “So there wasn’t any kind of love triangle there then, right? The whole Guinevere coming between Arthur and Lancelot never really happened?”

  “No, I have always considered Odeda as my sister and never anything more.”

  “Whew, that’s good, because I’d hate to have to hurt my friend, even if she is Herculina.”

  “You’d fight another girl over me?” I asked, enjoying the image that came to my mind of Keira attempting to be truly vicious.

  “In a heart beat,” she stated. “I might be mortal, but I’m strong for my size and I’ve taken several years of defense classes.”

  “I can’t picture you being jealous.”

  “Am I ever going to have reason to be jealous?”

  “No, not you.”

  “Not me?” She squinted in her thought process, an action that always contented me. Keira spoke her thoughts aloud, “The way you said that made it sound like someone has reason to be jealous…”

  I started to get a touch uncomfortable with the turn our conversation was taking. I shouldn’t have brought it up. We had gone from a bleak topic to joking around about the guild’s good ole days to an issue that I did not wish to discuss right then. “Do you want to split a dessert?” I failed to subtly change the subject.

  “I’m full- who has reason to be jealous, Uriel?” Keira’s green, concerned eyes searched mine.

  “No one important,” I told her.

  She lifted her brows. “Honestly?”

  “Honestly.”

  “Oookkay.” Keira looked confused.

  The waiter came by and handed me the check. I placed a bill in the leather folder and handed it back. Once he had walked away, I sought to assure Keira, who still looked disturbed, by saying, “I promise it’s no one important.”

  “No, it’s not that…”

  “Then what?”

  Keira closed her eyes in a moment of indecision and when she opened them again to gaze upon me, she was decided. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately…”

  “About my past lives,” I inferred from her earlier question.

  “Yes, but also about your future- and mine… Our future, actually. And how that can happen.”

  “Ah.”

  “Have you?- thought about it?”

  Had I thought about a future with Keira? Of course I had. Such thoughts were what kept me up at night, lying in my bed, staring at the ceiling, driving me mad with uncountable scenarios and plans- plans that I wasn’t sure were possible. Possible or not, I love Keira with all of myself. “I have thought about it,” I admitted.

  My mortal nodded stiffly, then in an unsure voice asked me, “Do you want any kind of long-term future with me?”

  “Of course I do, Keira. It’s just…” I gazed into her eyes and willed her to understand. “I know it’s difficult, but can you maybe wait until tomorrow for us to discuss this?”

  I saw tears threaten to escape Keira’s eyes but she blinked them fiercely away and nodded. She released my hand and stood up abruptly. “Yeah. Okay. Sure.”

  I grabbed for her wrist and stood in front of her, blocking her advance. “No, Keira- I’ve hurt your feelings. Please don’t be upset.” I wiped away a tear that had escaped her lashes, but she refused to look at me. “There is someone coming tomorrow, someone who affects our future, and that’s why I want to wait.”

  “I- I don’t understand.”

  “You just have to trust me. Tomorrow, most of our questions will be answered and our future together will be clearer.”

  Then she did look at me, with two watery, starry eyes that reminded me of those that are always found on female actresses in classic movies. My own Audrey Hepburn asked me hopefully, “Together?”

  “Yes, Keira.” I laughed humorlessly out of released anguish. “There is no future for me without you in it.”

  My mortal drew a breath and smiled. “That is a relief to hear because you were really starting to frighten me with all of that cryptic talk.”

  “I apologize, my love.”

  Our waiter came around the corner and hesitated a moment when he saw us standing, me still holding Keira’s wrist, but when she gave an embarrassed laugh at the situation, the young man strode the rest of the way to our table to deliver my change. “Keep it,” I told him and turned to Keira. “Are you ready to go?”

  “Yes, most definitely.”

  As we walked to the car, I asked Keira if she would like to go see a movie at the cinema.

  “Something light and happy would be nice,” she replied.

  On the way over, she sped again, and again, I lovingly called her out on it and was met with the same, unconcerned response.

  After two, mind-numbing hours of my life had passed, which had they not been spent sitting beside Keira would’ve been a complete and utter waste of my time, I walked out of the cinema with my girl snuggled under my arm as the sun was setting. “I had been wondering why we’d never gone to the movies before, but now I know,” I told her. “I am never watching another film of your choice unless it’s one I’ve already seen and know to be worth the hours it takes to sit through.”

  “It wasn’t that bad,” Keira laughed.

  “I think I lost IQ points in that theater.”

  “Shut up,” Keira smiled.

  “There is a very real possibility that I will have nightmares about the drama that is created by the female mind.”

  “Okay! We won’t see any more chick flicks. Does that make you happy?”

  “What might make me happy is if you slept over and protected me from the horrific phantoms of women’s shoes that will no doubt haunt my dreams tonight.”

  “Is my old-fashioned boyfriend really asking me to sleep over with him?”

  “There’s no bygone against sleeping, Keira.”

  “I see through your offer. I know the only reason you’re suggesting that is because you know I can’t, not with my parents in town and not even when they’re gone because Maria and Jerry have been very suspicious of you ever since that first night on the hiking trail.”

  “Fine, you caught me,” I disclosed. And then leaning in, as we stopped at her car, and pressing my lips to her ear, I whispered, “But just because I know we can’t, doesn’t mean I don’t still long to.”

  Keira’s heart quickened but all she said was, “If you’re going to complain about my driving the whole time, then you can drive me home.”

  She handed me the keys.

  Present and Future

  Chapter 21

  Keira

  It had been a tiring day with a roller coaster ride for my emotions to travel by, but I still managed to taunt Uriel on the ride home.
“Why are you driving so slowly?”

  “I’m going five over. That’s all I ever go over,” he answered, not the least bit provoked.

  I heaved an exaggerated sigh. “Come on, Grandpa. I’d like to get there today.”

  “You’re telling me you want to get back to your mother sooner rather than later?”

  I paused. “Well, no. But it feels like we’re crawling along.”

  “You’ve never commented on my driving before.”

  “Yeah, but I never paid attention before. Look- look!” I exclaimed while pointing at the VW Bug that was in the lane beside us. “The old man in that little, sad, Herbie car just passed us- an immortal and a perpetual speeder in an Aston Martin.”

  “What do you mean you never paid attention before?” he asked, ignoring my mockery. “Where was your fixation?”

  “On you,” I shrugged.

  Uriel gave me a side-glance that had a question mark all over its beauty.

  “You’re fun to look at while you drive,” I explained. “I usually like to sit here and stare at you the whole time.”

  He laughed. “Then sit there obediently now and don’t disrespect my five over tendency.”

  I couldn’t stop myself from mumbling, “You drove fast coming back from the mountain.”

  Of course he heard me and immediately defended himself. “Yes, but that was a singularly very stressful situation. And if I’m not completely mistaken you weren’t too happy with my speed then. Am I recalling correctly, or did you not squeal that I was going to break the speedometer?”

  I was silent for some time, but after a satisfied smirk crept onto Uriel’s face, I found a retort. “If you have such magnified reflexes, strength, and all that, then why do you insist on driving so slowly? I would have thought you’d be going as fast as lightning.”

  “You haven’t lived through times without airplanes, cars, motorcycles, and motorboats. Spend a good portion of your life never getting anywhere faster than your horse or your feet can take you, and I’d wager you’d have a lot more appreciation for the speed that modern machines allow.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” I faked a large, full-body yawn at his lecture. “Wake me when we get there.”

  He took the bait at last, his eyes narrowing on the road ahead, and floored it.

  My throat plummeted to my stomach, fingers and legs involuntarily tightened on the seat, and eyes attractively bugged out in surprise. The speed was incredible; I had no idea my car could go that fast, not that I really ever had the appropriate circumstances to find out here maximum. With my throat in the wrong part of my anatomy, I couldn’t voice my admission of defeat and was still struck dumb when we halted in front of my garage door as it opened slowly. Uriel shaved off at least five minutes of the time it would have taken me to get there. He rolled in, put it in park, and turned his smug eyes upon me. “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should. My heightened abilities and your parents’ money does not give us the right to drive like I just did and you have been doing today.”

  “Mmkay,” I yielded helplessly.

  “I will see you tomorrow, and you will meet the very important visitor who I told you about, alright?”

  “Mmkay.”

  Uriel killed the engine and handed me the keys before he got out and walked around to my side. Once I was standing with him, he asked, “Am I going in to say good-night to your parents and let your father know that I got you home in one piece? Or would you rather me leave you to slip in and dodge them on your own?”

  “You know me so well. I would attempt to dodge them and their questions and further critiquing if they were home, but they aren’t.” I pointed to a car-sized space between my Wrangler and Mother’s Lexus. “Looks like Dad took his Bentley Arnage and Mother out tonight. They usually go out with a group of friends who actually live within driving range whenever they come home from one of their trips. My guess is my parents won’t be home for hours.” I glanced at the garage’s clock. “It’s still early. Do you want to come in?”

  “Yes, but I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” Uriel said as he wrapped his arms around my waist.

  “Why?” I whined. Come on! Go a little crazy. “We could watch movies all night- I’ll let you choose which ones; we could raid the kitchen for all sorts of random and unhealthy snacks; we could even go for a swim.” I folded my hands on the back of his neck and pleaded with puppy-dog eyes.

  “A swim?”

  “You mean you can’t smell the chlorine from here? Hhmm, is that super sniffing of yours not working very well tonight?”

  “I know what Jerry and Maria had for dinner but no, I can’t detect any chlorine. I’m not a bloodhound seeking illegal substances, Keira.”

  “The pool is on the other side of the house,” I gave him a justification and then was back to trying to persuade him to stay longer. “We can get there in a few minutes. You could summon some swim trunks in a second, I’m betting.”

  “I could,” his voice said, but I could see in his eyes that he was already closed to the idea of staying.

  “But,” I sadly started for him.

  “But the guild has a lot of preparation that has to be done for tomorrow, no matter how much I wish I could stay. I want to make certain everything is set for our visitor because this next day could bring great opposition or great cooperation and assistance for yours and my combined future. It is incredibly important to me that we have his blessing.”

  “His?” my curiosity perked up.

  “Yes. I’ll tell you more, tomorrow afternoon, but for tonight, that will have to do.”

  I would have asked more questions nevertheless, but Uriel’s gaze had turned intense when he spoke of our future and my stomach began knotting up in a strangely excited response. My thoughts flashed back to the kiss in the restaurant’s parking lot earlier that day. I had never felt anything more corporal for or from Uriel than in that moment, not even in the rain after the first time he’d said he loved me. The look in his raging cobalt eyes made me wonder if Nephilim had heightened senses and heightened passions, but before I could speculate any more on my thoughts on the speculation, Uriel leaned down to press his lips to mine and made it undeniable that the Nephilim with me then could heighten my passion.

  We breathed each other in and melded into one, but it still wasn’t enough. It was almost unbelievable to me that I had ever doubted his willingness to get close to me all those months ago when I hesitated to take his hand or touch his cheek without some hint that it was acceptable by him. We belonged to each other. He was mine and I was his, and therefore Uriel was not the least bit tentative as he slid my jacket from my shoulders and blindly but deftly tossed it onto the hood of the car.

  I could feel the muscles in his chest contract as he held me closer, repelling any chill that the late fall air kept contained in the cement room. I was getting more apt at rationing my breathing after the couple of times of practice, and I was really enjoying memorizing the contours of my angel’s being. In all the months we’d spent together, I had yet to find a single thing wrong with him- other than the driving. There was not an inch that I did not love.

  He was the first to break our connection, running his fingers through my hair one more time as our lips separated from each others as. “Why can’t you come in?” I asked softly.

  Uriel smiled warmly and said, “We have to resist temptation.”

  “I’m sixteen,” I complained quietly. “So many hormones make it hard to resist.”

  “I’m a man,” he countered. “It’s exceptionally difficult for me as well.”

  But not bloody difficult enough, apparently, or else I’d be on top of my jacket on the Aston’s hood by now, I thought indignantly.

  “I must go.”

  “Okay,” I sighed.

  “Do you want me to walk you to the front door?” he offered.

  “No, I’ll go through Mother’s home office since she’s not here.” I could hear the disappointment in my voice so I knew he could
as well.

  Uriel kissed my lips lightly once more and whispered, “Dream about me tonight as I dream of you.”

  “Like I have a choice,” I smiled. “My unconsciousness takes pleasure in teasing me almost as much as you do.”

  Uriel only grinned, stepped away from me and over to the side door, and said in my favorite tone of his, “Goodnight, Keira.”

  “Night,” I dreamily said after he had disappeared into the darkness outside and closed the door.

  I thoughtlessly picked up my jacket and drifted into my Mother’s cluttered office, through the hallway, and up the stairs to my room where I dropped the jacket, changed into a very large t-shirt, and climbed into bed. But once I was almost settled into a nice, languid state, my mind started arguing with my body that it wasn’t time to sleep. My bedside clock said it was almost eight; glancing at it didn’t help my body’s case in the dispute.

  My brain’s first act once it had officially won the conflict was to fret over who the visitor I was to meet the next day would be. It was a he, apparently, but what else did I know? He couldn’t be mortal- that was obvious. I was supposed to be the only mortal around who knew what Uriel and the others are- aliens. Kind of. Not really. Just half out of this world. And the new he had to be a Nephilim too, or one of those beings who is totally out of this world. That would be interesting.

  But I did know that I’d have to make a good impression so Uriel and I wouldn’t face great opposition and would instead receive great cooperation and assistance, whatever that means.

  This was freaking fantastic. I had just spent a night and the better part of a morning worrying about Mother and Father accepting Uriel and just when I think I can finally relax, I’m told that pretty much the only imaginable future for me lies in the hands of some dude I’m to meet tomorrow. The bats in my stomach had frequented so often that I could now clearly distinguish the number of them- three- but they still moved with such speed and force that they made their own outsized dance party whenever they came. I’ve been thinking of naming them. I mean, they were practically denizens of my abdomen by now, so even if I couldn’t keep track of exactly which one is which, that doesn’t mean I couldn’t give them all names. Aphrodite, Mimi, and Victor were three that came to mind; they were all vampire pests from some books I had read recently, and the irony might just be enough to make me smile every time I think of them or feel them dancing instead of my standard reaction of grimacing.