by Lila Felix
My shoulder stiffened and an unwarranted gasp left my mouth. I copped an attitude in defense. I didn’t push everyone who loved me away.
I didn’t push Ari away—not today.
I’d pushed Theo away for his own good.
My mom was more of a friend than a mother. She didn’t really want to be around me that much anyway.
Shit.
“I don’t know.”
Collin cleared his throat. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m here for good. Maybe all that Synod training and studying will allow me to help with more than just my brawn.”
“Thank you, Collin.”
I felt the sun blistering my skin but I couldn’t tear myself away from the beams of warmth. I missed these little things—sun—warmth—life.
After sitting a long time in silence, I broke it. “How do I restore the masses without tipping off the Synod?”
I was thinking aloud more than asking Collin, but he answered anyway. “I’ve been thinking about this, also. I’ve come up with a plan. If the Resin begin congregating to Portugal, the Synod will notice. But if you travel to them—there’s no way they would know. They would simply think you were hopping around, waiting for the Eidolon to get back.”
“How do they know Theo’s gone?”
His big hand patted the top of mine where it was planted, keeping me balanced.
Shit. If Sanctum was lying all this time—he was probably feeding the Synod information—all the information.
I threw my head back in anger—and hit Collin in the back of the head.
He ignored the blunder.
He chuckled and then said, “Have you not learned who you can trust?”
“I’m a slow learner.”
He snarked back at me, “Too slow to catch a cold.”
A giggle started in my mouth but soon progressed into a gut busting laugh that echoed through the gardens and made me fall sideways in glee. I hadn’t laughed that hard in a long time—too long of a time.
“Okay, did you two kiss and make up? Because Sway is back and she’s brought a friend,” Ari said while she smiled.
Double shit.
“She did what?” Collin and I spoke at the same time.
Ari stuck her hip out. “Did I stutter? Come on.”
I didn’t believe my eyes when I walked into the house. Sway was there and the person she’d brought was so not a friend—boyfriend would be the more operative word—at least that’s what it looked like to me since they were otherwise preoccupied with inhaling each other.
“Ahem.” I made such a classy entrance. The anger boiled in my veins as I took in the scene. Not only had Sway betrayed my trust less than a day after I’d gone out on a limb to help her, but now she was really pushing it.
She stuttered, “Oh, Colby. Sorry. This is Chance.”
Chance and Sway—that might be the cutest thing ever. No, wait, I was supposed to be pissed, but as I looked at their clasped hands, I couldn’t do anything but smile.
“Hi, Chance,” I said and did some weird chin-tip at him.
“Colby, look, I know I wasn’t supposed to say anything—” I finished for her in my head, but I have the biggest mouth in the South. “—but Chance has always wanted to travel the world and we want to be sealed.”
I zeroed in on Chance, a boy with a mohawk and the most perfect beard I’d ever seen. No wonder Sway was taken with him. His blue eyes looked at me and then down as though he was ashamed.
Pointing to Sway, I attempted to be diplomatic. “You know what she is?”
He nodded and looked to Sway whose cheeks reddened like I’d never seen before.
“Do you know the story of how we received our powers? Do you know that taking her as your mate includes keeping her secret at all costs—even your own life?”
He cleared his throat and took a step forward. “I’d never do anything to jeopardize her. She’s my life.”
Ari repeated her action from the meeting at the Synod faking a gag with her finger pointed down her throat. She’d never been a romantic.
“But I don’t know how you received your powers. I don’t know much. I don’t even think Sway knows. I’ve asked.”
Sway shrugged at me. She’d never been much on the why, almost always about the how.
“Here, let me tell you the story so you know what a lucky bastard you are.”
I sat on the couch and they surrounded me, even Collin pulled up a chair like a child ready to be shown a version of Red Riding Hood. He probably knew the story better than I did, but maybe this was part of who I was now. There was a reason why I’d always delved whole-heartedly into the histories of our people and how we became the proud race we were today.
The reason was, I was the mate of the Eidolon and my job was to restore not only the powers to those who had them stolen, but to restore the truth to the masses.
The real truth—and that may be the greatest threat to the Synod.
I realized then, telling the story of Xoana and how she was blessed with a shot of lightning to her temple, that this was how I would kill the Synod. Not by slices or my bare hands. I would strangle the life of the Synod with the thing they feared the most—the truth.
I would tell them the truth of Xoana.
I would tell them the truth of the Prophetesses.
I would tell them the truth of Rebekah and paint her the martyr she was.
It would cut them off at their pointy red heels.
And render them powerless.
I finished up the story, “So that’s why males kiss their mates on the temple, in a show of affection. It is the place where the Almighty kissed Xoana with lightning and changed everything.”
Sway folded her hands in her lap and bowed her head. “I should’ve known that story. The thing is—I could’ve never told it the way you did. You sounded like Rebekah.”
I had to fight against an onslaught of pride at her comparison. It wasn’t valid after all. I would never measure up to the Prophetess, but I was humbled at the thought.
“I’m sure Theodore would be happy to seal the two of you. And I’ll be the opposition—just in case you need one. Because no one is ever going to be good enough for Sway in my eyes,” I said.
Sway and Chance began their own conversation in hushed whispers about where they wanted to go next. I’d assumed Ari was the one who filled her in on travelling with other people. She couldn’t keep her mouth shut either.
My chest felt hollow having epiphany after epiphany without Theo around. It didn’t seem real unless he knew. It didn’t feel real unless I spoke it to him.
Here I was, able to restore power to our people and he was gone.
While he was gone, there was work to be done.
I turned and decided now was as good a time as any. “Collin, how do we find the Resin?”
He squared off his shoulders in a stance that read soldier more than friend. “I’m not sure. I have some records on my memory card, but the most recent, say the last five years, I don’t have access to them.”
Somehow, I would have to find a way to find the Resin and convince them that I could restore their powers—if they wanted them back. A lot of them had taken to hunting our kind—out of revenge or orders, I didn’t know.
Sway interjected, “I know where most of them are. A few keep to themselves, but the rest—I can find them.”
Ari, Collin, and I all asked at the same time, “How?”
Sway rolled her eyes with a ‘pfft.’ “Come on, Colby. It’s the age of social media, chat rooms, and secret groups. You don’t think the Resin are exempt from that, do you?”
“Sway?” If she’d done all the research…
“Yeah, I know. I dabbled in becoming one of them.” She referred to the Resin that hunted us. “I was offered my powers back, but then I remembered my mom telling stories of the Eidolon—saying he was the only one who could restore our powers. I knew they were just bullshitting me. But I guess even she was wrong. It’s the Eidolon and his mate.”
I
didn’t have time to question Sway’s allegiance. I knew she told the truth.
“Find concentrations of them, Sway. We’ll start with the biggest groups first. The faster I move, the harder it will be for the Synod to keep up. Collin, you have to stay close to me or Ari—if something goes down, we will flash you out of there. We have places—secure spots around the world.”
From childhood, Ari and I maintained safe houses: the abandoned train station outside of Tokyo—a cave in Venezuela—islands that no one had ever seen except from an aerial view.
“That doesn’t feel like me protecting you.” I turned my head to correct him, but Collin wasn’t talking to me—he was speaking directly to Ari and her face betrayed any attempts to deny a connection I’d somehow missed along the way.
That dance after our sealing must’ve been some hell of a time.
She answered without missing a beat, “It’s not about who is protecting who, Collin. It’s about us all making it out alive.”
He nodded, but I could tell he was struggling with his new role.
“I’ll need your records too, Collin. Maybe some of these people intersect and I can catch them all at the same time,” I said.
“Colby?” Ari prompted. She had a worried tone again.
“Yeah?”
“What if you—you know, pass out again or whatever happened with Sway?”
I thought about it for a while. My answer might be different if Theo was here. But he wasn’t. He was doing what he was made to do and I was about to embark on a journey that was my own and shared at the same time.
Ari and everyone else in the room looked genuinely concerned, but I was having none of it. Now I knew I wasn’t anything like Sevella and it didn’t have anything to do with her being human.
It was because I was the one made for this purpose.
Slapping my hands on my thighs, I answered, “Then you wake my ass up and we move on to the next one. You think Theo gets a break up there? You think for one minute that someone up there is looking out for him? I mean, of course the Almighty is with him, but… I’m not there. No one is up there to make sure he’s okay. In fact…”
“He’s with the devil himself.” Collin finished for me.
***
Two days later, we were in North Dakota of all places. There was a concentration of Resin living off the land in a makeshift commune and when we got there I thought they’d be going through hardships.
But they were thriving. And it spoke so loudly of my people—of the females of Xoana.
No matter what, we Lucent women made that shit work.
We had taken the time to prep. We all packed and washed our clothes. Ari and Sway shopped for necessary items that we needed, like jackets, boots, and coats—because it was freaking North Dakota. I kept busy with Collin. He gave me incessant lectures on everything he knew about the Eidolon and we tried, in vain, to determine the truth from the lies. Either way, it was all good information.
And together, like the Lucent Avengers, we travelled as a team, flashing right into the heart of the Resin community.
Which could’ve been the greatest disaster or the best blessing.
The first one to approach me was a woman named Chloe. She was a proud woman with a pixie cut and arms that Tina Turner would drool over. Her fierce eyes peered into mine, testing the truth of what I told her. I didn’t blame her. The words tumbled out of my mouth with no rhyme or reason. I’d be surprised if they didn’t burn us right there for blasphemy.
I feared the worst.
Mostly, I feared that they would ask to see Theo, who was currently otherwise occupied.
Or think that I was a fraud—or worse, one of the Synod.
“Prove it.” She practically spat at me and the rest of the crowd cheered her proposition on.
I stepped forward, taking a deep breath. “I can only prove it if you allow me to restore your ability to travel. Other than that, all I have are witnesses and the one person I have restored.”
She cackled. “You? It is told that only the Eidolon restores powers.”
She had a point, but not a good one.
I countered, but remained calm and steady, remembering all the times Theo had maintained that cool under pressure. “It is told by who? The Synod? The same ones who conspired to take your powers? The same ones who threaten the life of the Eidolon? The same ones who murdered the last Prophetess of our time? They feed you lies and we eat them up like we are starving children instead of miracles of the Almighty.” By the time I was done, I heard the strength emanating from me.
“How do you know about the Prophetess?” I could tell by Chloe’s tone that Rebekah’s position among our people was held in reverence. I scanned the crowd that had gathered and saw the same concern marring every face, even those of the males.
A tear ran down my face. “She was my grandmother. I saw her—murdered.”
Some gasped. One woman sobbed. They all were shocked.
Chloe asked, “How?”
I shook my head. It was too much to relive over and over again.
“Try on me.” An older woman came forward. She was small in stature and had a white lace cloth covering her head. She moved slowly and my first reaction was to question what this woman could’ve done in her old age to deserve such a punishment. Or maybe her powers were taken in youth. Either way, it was not necessary.
“No, me first. She might hurt you, Nana.” This was Chloe’s grandmother and as the frail woman stepped back into the crowd, her grin told me that the scheme for Chloe had gone exactly how she wanted it to.
I waited a second and then stepped toward the strong female. “Give me your hands.”
I left Sanctum in the Fray.
I chose a point in time when I could still smell the ocean, but found that the scent of my mate was fading by the second. It was coupled with a time when Sanctum was otherwise too occupied to leave.
And then I left him there.
If he could get himself to hell and back to the Fray, he could travel back and forth to wherever else he wanted to go in the world.
I landed in the gardens right outside the circle where Rebekah was buried. This time coming back felt different. There was no muscle weakness—or it was lessened. I wasn’t disoriented. I was clear-headed and felt instantly less heavy.
And I knew without a doubt that my mate was far from Portugal.
She wasn’t even in the vicinity.
What in the hell was she up to now?
Not hesitating, and not needing to like I did before, I flashed to where I saw her, somewhere with mountains. I could see them in the distance.
And I could see my mate dressed like the cutest Eskimo alive.
“Holy—Eidolon…” Ari changed her tune, realizing it was me and did some kind of gnarly bow or curtsy.
“No, I’m not holy.” I joked.
Before I knew what was about to happen, two long and lithe arms wrapped around my neck and nearly knocked me over. The soul-churning scent of ocean waves consumed me and I held on tight. I did that thing that I loathed my mother doing. She’d always hugged me with some inventory of how I was doing—that’s what I did to Colby, felt for her ribs, down her back, making sure she’d been eating—that she was okay. It wasn’t that easy with her wearing so many layers, but I tried.
“You got to me before I could get to you.” She giggled and hugged tighter with both her arms and legs.
I laughed and buried my face in her hair. “That’s the way it’s supposed to be.”
“I missed you.”
“You have no idea.”
She clung to me like a baby Koala, and I took the opportunity to frame her face with my hands, staring into her blue eyes to make sure she spoke the truth about her being okay. Then I stopped hesitating and took her mouth, reveling in her warmth and the way she’d missed me that showed in every movement she made. Colby tightened her legs around my waist and groaned with me.
“Ahem,” Collin made the sound loud and proud lik
e he was doing us a favor.
“What, Collin?” I growled barely pulling away.
“You have an audience, Eidolon. A little decorum.” He was all business. It made me stop what I was doing—reluctantly.
I brushed Colby’s hair aside and intended to tear Collin a new asshole when I saw that we weren’t alone—not even close. There must’ve been at least five hundred people.
“You’re in big trouble,” I grunted into Colby’s ear. “You too, Viking.”
“You have no idea,” she parroted.
I let Colby down slowly, giving myself more time with her and more time to process and come up with my own hypotheses about what in the hell was happening and how long I’d been gone. Long enough for Colby to really get into some sludge.
“Theo, this is a community of Resin.” The crowd laughed at some private joke she’d made in six words.
A woman with short hair spoke, “Some of us. She’s trying her best. If we could just keep her from fainting all the time. We call her the fainting goat.”
Balling my hands into fists, I stilled myself, determined not to let the situation best me, especially before I knew the volume of it. Inside, I was shaking with fear and anger, tangled together and all harped on the word ‘fainting.’
“Excuse me, Colby, Collin, Ari, Sway and whoever Sway is attached to by the hand, may I speak to you privately?” I barely got the words out.
Stomping over to the nearest clearing I threw my hands in the air, submitting to whatever was occurring around me.
“It’s my fault.” They all said at once. And they all looked equally guilty.
“Colby, you first.”
She spoke with a new confidence and if it weren’t for my frustration, I would’ve praised her for it. “It’s my fault. I knew there were tons of Resin here because Sway told me. She flashed here first to scope it out and then we all came. I’m doing the best I can. I think maybe together we can get more done faster.”
Ari took that as her cue. “Plus it would help if you could keep her from losing her shit every five minutes.”
“Everyone stop.” I raised my voice a twinge and saw Colby flinch. It couldn’t be helped. I was barely keeping myself together. Whatever they were doing here was hurting my mate and the fact that they’d made it all some joke, complete with a nickname wasn’t helping anything.
