Syrus had been enjoying the cool cleaning refreshment the same way Forest had when she hit the water, but the second he broke through the surface and inhaled, he snapped to his feet behind her. He inhaled again greedily. The smell of her skin and the water sluicing over it was intoxicating, but there was something else. The energy pulsing from her hit his skin and absorbed deep into his core. Everything about her was screaming for him.
She could feel his heightened senses reaching out from his body, upping her already throbbing adrenaline left over from their victory. He said nothing, but stood a foot behind her. Even through the splashing water, she could hear his breathing. Or maybe she could just feel it. He moved closer slowly. Awareness rolled down through Forest from the top of her scalp. She held still as he closed the empty space, moving slowly, slowly closer until his bare chest pressed against her back. She leaned back against him, feeling him breathe in and out. The moment drew out into a tantric aching.
Please. Please He thought. Please, Forest, don’t fight what you feel for me.
Just once, she thought. Now, here. Just once let yourself be loved. Know your mate once, and then you can let him go.
Forest turned to Syrus and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. Wariness came into his expression. She pulled his wounded hand up close to her face; it was already mending.
“Does it still hurt?” she asked quietly.
“Not much.”
She raised it to her mouth and kissed it gently. Goosebumps covered his skin at the touch of her mouth. He pulled his hand from hers and dragged his fingers through her hair. She stretched up on her toes and pulled his face down to hers.
“Forest…Please,” he whispered.
She placed her hand gently over his mouth. “Yes, Syrus. Yes to everything.”
Syrus’ touch, Syrus’ lips, drowned out her reason and her thoughts until all she could hear was her own pulse and the falling of the water. He held her tightly against him and pulled her into the dark cavern behind the waterfall. This would be her one true memory of him, of them. However short the night might be, every second would be forever burned into her soul. The cavern was small, and the water pooled around their waists. Light danced on the wet stone walls in a ceaseless echo of silver shimmer, and the falling water made an undulating diamond curtain over the mouth of the cave. Their breathing, like the light, echoed around the confined space.
The moments flashed by, and Forest’s mind had completely turned off. The water they stood in would surely begin to boil soon, just as steam was literally rising off their skin. Emotion built pressure inside her, and she began talking breathlessly without any thought as to what she was saying. “I need to tell you something,” she said against his lips.
He moved his mouth to her ear. “You’re not going to tell me to stop, are you?” he whispered.
She chuckled. “No…I…” She bit down into his shoulder. Why was she talking? She didn’t have anything to say. Her mouth stayed happily employed on his skin for a few minutes when the words began to bubble up again. Her brain was a thicker fog than the one they were creating. So lost in her senses, she hadn’t noticed that his touch had changed from sexual to curious.
“I need to tell you something,” she said again not sure at all what was going to come spilling out of her mouth.
His arm wrapped around the back of her waist, pinning her left arm to her side and her whole torso against his. “Oh? Is it about this?” The venom in his voice sucked all the heat out of the cave and flipped the switch, turning Forest’s brain back on.
His hand moved up and down along the length of her scars. Forest cursed herself for stupidly believing she could make love to him without him noticing. She couldn’t breathe when she saw the look on his face—disgust, pure and undeniable. Her eyes broke like full glasses of water, and her heart collapsed in on itself. She tried to pull away but he held her fast.
“They’re just battle scars,” she muttered through her tears.
“Don’t lie to me!” he shouted, insane with rage. “Do you think I don’t know what this is?” he demanded. “Do you?!”
“Please…” she whimpered.
“Why didn’t you tell me?! Why, Forest?”
“I couldn’t, Syrus,” she sobbed.
“Who did this to you?”
“Please let me go, Syrus.”
“Who did this to you? TELL ME! I’m gonna kill him. I’m gonna tear his arms off and cut out his tongue and gouge out his eyes. No, he’ll watch me pull his heart from his chest and drink the blood from it before I show a single shred of mercy.”
Forest couldn’t stand this. The repulsed look on his face and his irate ranting was too much, and she began thrashing against him. “Let me go! Let me go!”
Syrus held her tighter and felt slowly and meticulously down the length of her scars. This was so much worse than anything she had ever imagined. His expression began to morph from disgust to utter shock as he touched every last ridge of her skin.
“What the hell?” he muttered under his breath.
Forest stumbled backwards as he abruptly let go of her. She bolted through the water before he could change his mind and pin her again or ask her any more questions.
Syrus stood still, his body weighed down with immeasurable heaviness. How could it be possible? Who could be capable of doing such a thing? The vampire that had marked Forest had broken ancient law and placed two different kinds of marks on her. The lovers mark was only used by vampires in committed relationships in a ceremony setting. The lovers mark on Forest entwined with a slave mark. She was the property of the sucker who had marked her. He had total control over her, forced obedience. Against his will, Syrus’ mind blurred with images of things he wished he’d never imagined. He had to know the truth.
Forest ran through the darkness back to their camp. How could she ever face him again? What could she say? Her mind got stuck on one thought that repeated over and over,Damn you, Leith! Damn you! She had wanted one night, just one night to love Syrus, and Leith had ruined that. Now it would never happen. Now Syrus found her gross, and he wouldn’t want to touch her ever again.
She quickly rummaged through her bag and found some clean jeans and a shirt. She put them on as fast as she could, in case Syrus came back to camp. She didn’t think she could face him now. She needed to regroup and come up with a convincing lie that would explain her scars. Maybe she could convince Syrus that they weren’t what he thought they were.
But she wasn’t fast enough. Syrus came charging out of the darkness and hit her with a spell that lifted her three inches off the ground. The spell held her immobile in the air. She could talk and look around, but nothing else.
“What are you doing?” she demanded.
“I need the truth, and you won’t give it to me, or you can’t.”
Forest had thought her horror had reached its pitch for the evening but she’d been wrong.
Syrus held his hands next to the sides of her head. His jaw clenched so tightly she could hear his teeth grinding together.
“No, Please! Please, Syrus don’t do this! All I have is my pride. Really, that’s all. I’m begging you, don’t make me debase myself.”
His look of determination faltered, and he turned away from her, pacing back and forth. His fists clenched and unclenched over and over. He muttered and argued with himself.
“No! I have to know, Forest.” He put his hands back next to her head.
“Please!” she sobbed.
“I’ll only take the memories directly connected to your scars.”
“NO!” But her protest was cut off as she was forced to look at the memories that were now transferring into Syrus’ mind. She had never wanted to die so badly.
Syrus was disoriented as he began to experience Forest’s memories. It wasn’t like watching a movie or being a bystander. He saw through her eyes, from her perspective. Forest watched as Syrus lived what she had. He shut his eyes as if that could make him more blind and continuously sh
ook his head back and forth. It didn’t take long for him to see all he needed to.
Syrus turned his back on her. The spell broke and dropped Forest in a heap on the ground. She watched him walk away until the shadows swallowed him. Forest turned her face into the ground and wept. A second later, Syrus raised his voice in a roar of rage and agony that split the sky and rippled through the entire wood. Forest got to her feet and ran in the opposite direction, to the Heart.
Syrus returned to the camp as soon as he had regained some level of self-control and found Forest gone. He didn’t know if he was relieved that she was gone or not. He needed more time to digest the truth. The last thing he wanted was to injure her further by saying something stupid. He sat down and placed his head in his hands. She’d been so young, so very young to be the victim of such a terrible crime. Seeing it through her eyes had been traumatizing to Syrus and it helped him understand to a level he certainly didn’t desire. Experiencing the memory of the first time Leith had raped her had caused something inside Syrus to break.
Rage boiled the blood in his head again as he thought about how the bastard had stalked her, and laid in wait with a handful of shadow sand that he threw into her eyes the second she walked around that corner. She had been covered with his bite marks that time, giving him a strong, persuasive power over her. He made her come to him over and over, and she’d had no choice. But she fought, and he was in danger of her killing him or reporting him, but that was before he’d truly marked her.
Syrus had to remind himself that they weren’t his memories. He felt what she felt, and he wished he could wipe it from his mind. But he needed to examine closely what Leith had done to create the mark he left on Forest. Reluctantly he brought her memory back to the forefront of his mind from where his subconscious was already trying to bury it.
Leith had brutalized her that night, worse than any other time before. Forest focused her eyes on the pile of her ripped clothes by her head and concentrated her mind on how best to repair the spilt seams while Leith satiated himself on her. He’d abruptly gotten up and left the room when he was done, leaving her exposed and broken on the floor. She was about to get up and try to leave when he came back with a rope. Syrus shuddered and forced himself to continue watching.
Leith had an old book open on the floor next to where Forest was tied up.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going to make you mine forever. I love you that much.”
Leith studied the book for a few minutes. Forest knew it was futile to scream, no one would hear. If they did, they wouldn’t care. It was futile to beg—he would only get off on that. She had no weapons, nothing to bargain with. She couldn’t even move. So she lay quietly, watching the person she hated most in the world as he poured over a book in the last minutes of her freedom.
Leith lay the book aside and began her slave mark first. Slave marks were supposed to be small straight lines on the upper part of the arm. Leith started just under Forest’s ear, and using his sharpest incisor sliced an unbroken line to her elbow. Then he bit into one of his fingers and bled a line of his blood into her wound. It was the first time Forest wished for death. Her flesh pulled together and began healing. She was property now. Her inferiority was complete, the knowledge imbued inside her.
Syrus didn’t know if that was worse than what came next. His rage had grown into an inferno and was salivating for Leith’s blood. There was only one tiny shred of sanity inside him, and it demanded that he finish watching her memory.
Lover’s marks were simple. Two vampires in a loving, committed relationship often marked each other as a symbol of monogamy. It’s simply a deep bite with transference of blood. Before biting, each vampire will pool a small amount of their own blood in their mouth, usually by cutting a small place on the tongue by running it along a sharp tooth. The bite mark heals into a crescent scar. Lover’s marks strengthen the love between the two, but it is by no means unbreakable. Ending a relationship and taking a new lover will erase the previous mark.
Leith began again just under her ear and bit her seven times, entwining the crescents with the straight slave mark. The lover’s marks confused Forest’s heart. At times, she believed he loved her, and occasionally she questioned if she might love him in return. Leith had created something new with Forest, and Syrus didn’t know if it could be removed.
Syrus took a few deep breaths and let his mind release the memory back into the dark recesses where he wanted to wall it in. He hated himself for taking her memories. He had raped her as well, just in a different way, and he’d give anything to undo it. He feared she’d never let him close to her again.
He thought back to right before, when they were together under the waterfall. Her willingness to be with him, wanting to be with him, and he knew now how all those scars must have hurt every time he touched her. That alone was a testament to how much she really must feel for him. His heart pulled as he realized the extent.
Syrus stood abruptly and calling on the strength of his senses, he ran after her.
Forest reached the ribcage with the thought of finding Shi, but now she was so distraught she didn’t even know which direction she had come from. She fell at the base of a tree and tried to will herself to die. She pressed her hands over her heart and closed her eyes.
“Stop,” she whispered to her heart, her voice growing faint. “Stop, stop, stop, stop… just let me die.”
Her heart didn’t listen. “Don’t you get it?” she said to the stupid organ. “He doesn’t want you. He’ll never want you.”
“That’s not true.”
Forest startled at the sound of Syrus’ voice behind her. He strode up to her, bent over, and scooped her off the ground. Forest went limp in his arms. She had no more fight left. He turned around and began carrying her back towards their camp.
“You love me, don’t you?”
She sighed heavily. “I did.”
“You will again.”
She collapsed into sleep on his shoulder and knew no more until morning.
****
Forest’s head throbbed when she awoke, her eyes reluctant to open. Awkward didn’t even begin to describe the way she felt about facing Syrus. Now that she had rested, she was determined to regain some level of respect. She had to rebuild the walls he had toppled. She had to push him away again. Damn it, she’d even told him that she loved him. At least she’d used the word in the past tense.
She could hear him moving around next to her and kept her eyes clamped shut before she reminded herself stupidly that she couldn’t fake him out by keeping her eyes closed. He probably knew she was awake before she did.
He sat cross-legged on the ground, his face smooth and contemplative. He’d put on a clean T-shirt, but he still wore the same jeans as yesterday. There was a tear over his right knee, and the hems were dirty and beginning to fray.
Forest felt overwhelmed with sorrow as she looked at him. Stealing her memories was unforgivable; just like a vampire to take whatever they wanted no matter what it cost others. She nestled down into the familiar feeling of hate. But hate in regards to Syrus was shallow. She stared at him. His short hair was a mess in a way humans thought fashionable; she wanted to comb it. She remembered when she’d cut it and he’d touched her face. If only he could really look at her without it bonding them together forever. When the wizard healed him, she wanted him to see her just once. But that was a desire that must always remain unfulfilled.
Forest groaned as she sat up, rubbing her thumping temples. He said nothing. She waited, but he kept silent. Why did he have to be so composed when she felt like she’d just woken up with a hangover in a strange bed, hardly knowing what she’d done? Forest opened her mouth in a silent scream, which she directed at him.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
“Your breathing was strange just now.”
“So?”
Syrus shrugged. There was a long uncomfortable silence. Forest
began to busy herself with rolling up her sleeping bag and straightening up her stuff. Her stomach rumbled, but she didn’t think she could eat anything. She wanted to get searching again for Maxcarion, and she was thankful that it was still necessary for them to keep their talking to a minimum.
“All right, I want to move our camp to the Heart for tonight if we are unsuccessful locating the wizard today.”
“Whatever you think is best,” he said vaguely.
“Have you eaten? Are you ready to go?” Forest hated the nasty tone of her voice, but she didn’t think she could do anything about it.
“I’m ready.”
Forest strapped on her backpack and adjusted her shirt. She gave a quick second look around to make sure they were leaving nothing behind. Syrus put his pack on, and before she could give him orders, he walked slowly into her space and reached for her forearm. Forest’s eyes went wide, and she contemplated jerking out of his grip, but she waited to see what he was doing. His face was pained and it broke down her new defenses. She frantically grabbed at them to put them back up.
“We need to get moving, Syrus,” she tried to keep her voice firm.
“I want you to forgive me for what I did last night.”
“What you want is irrelevant.”
“Tell me what you want me to do, and I’ll do it.”
Forest’s heart trembled. Be cold, she told herself. She lifted his hand off her arm and took a step back. “Give me some space, Syrus. That’s what I want from you.”
He sighed dejectedly and nodded. “All right.”
Hours passed as they searched for Maxcarion. The day grew unseasonably hot, and Forest found it harder and harder to concentrate. Syrus followed her as she led them nowhere, to the middle of it, and back around the edges, over and over. With every new line of sweat that slid down her back she grew more and more frustrated.
Syrus kept his distance as she had asked him to, but the space brought her no peace. He was a walking volcano of emotion, churning and brewing, and impossible for her to ignore.
Forbidden Forest (The Legends of Regia) Page 20
